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^plija f&rttanntca; 

OR 

PORTRAITS OF FOREST TREES 




Hail, old pa-tricia.a trees' 

arched walks of twilight groves 

And shadows brown, that .Svlvan loves . 
Of pine, or monumental oak 



^^Iba jirttanntca; 



OR, 



PORTRAITS OF FOREST TREES, 



DISTINGUISHED FOR THEIR 



ANTIQUITY, MAGNITUDE, OR BEAUTY. 
DRAWN FROM NATURE 



JACOB GEORGE STRUTT, 



AUTHOR OF "DELICI^ SYL VARUM," &c. 



Hail, old patrician trees ! 

Cowley. 

arched walks of twilight groves 

And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves, 
Of pine, or monumental oak. 

MiLTOX. 



LONDON: 
PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR, 

8, DUKE STREET, ST. JAMES's, 
BY LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN. 



BY 




PRINTED BY A. J. VALPY, 
RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET. 



TO HIS GRACE 

THE DUKE OF BEDFORD. 



My Lord Duke, 

When I first entreated Your Grace's permission to 
dedicate to the Representative of the House of Russell the fol- 
lowing Portraits of Forest Trees, I was influenced by 
an irresistible association in my own mind between the stedfast- 
ness and independence universally attributed to the " Lord of the 
Woods, the long-surviving Oak," and the same characteristics 
which have for ages past distinguished the noble family of 
Bedford ; a family, whose name will be always venerated in the 
annals of English History, as the champions of lawful right and 
well-regulated liberty ; and whose public virtues are combined in 
the descendant whom I have now the honour to address, with 
" all the mild charities of private life," to which, for the happiness 
of those by whom he is surrounded, it is his pleasure chiefly to 
devote himself. 

I have only to add, that among the numerous gratifica- 
tions I have derived from my work, favoured as it has been, during 
its progress, with marks of public approbation far exceeding 
any that my hopes had anticipated, the greatest is the opportunity 
afforded me, by its completion, of testifying to the world the pride 
and gratitude with which I have the honour to subscribe myself. 

My Lord Duke, 
Your Grace's Most Obedient 

and Devoted Servant, 

JACOB GEORGE STRUTT. 



PREFACE. 



On the completion of the Sylva Britannica in the 
Folio Edition, the Author was intreated by several highly 
esteemed friends to add a Supplement to the work, for the 
purpose of including various specimens cf Trees which the 
original limits did not admit of containing. But however flat- 
tering those solicitations might be, his unwillingness to incur 
the slightest appearance of trespassing on the liberality of his 
Subscribers, formed an insuperable bar to his compliance 
with them. To the wish, however, which has been very fre- 
quently expressed, that the work should be brought out 
anew, in a form of which neither the size nor expense should 
place it beyond general circulation, not the most fastidious 
delicacy could raise a scruple. The Author, therefore, 
trusts that the present, comparatively small, Edition, will 
afford a gratification similar to that which a lover of art 
derives from comparing a finished miniature with the same 
subject in full size— fidelity of representation being alike 



vi 



PREFACE. 



adhered to in both instances. In the present arrangement 
of the plates, and consequently of the letter-press, some 
deviation has been made from the original plan ; which, as 
the work came out in numbers, aimed at giving a variety of 
subjects in each, in order to avoid any appearance of mono- 
tony ; but as in the present form the whole is brought before 
the eye at once, it has been deemed advisable to place all the 
specimens of each description of tree together, as thereby 
enabling a more accurate idea to be formed of their compa- 
rative sizes and characteristics. In all other respects, it is 
hoped that every thing which may wear the aspect of 
alteration, will be better explained by the term addition or 
amendment. 



Hammersmith, May 25, 1830. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Among all the varied productions with which Nature 
has adorned the surface of the earth, none awakens our 
sympathies, or interests our imagination, so powerfully as 
those venerable trees which seem to have stood the lapse of 
ages — silent witnesses of the successive generations of man, 
to whose destiny they bear so touching a resemblance, alike 
in their budding, their prime, and their decay. 

Hence, in all ages, the earliest dawn of civilization has 
been marked by a reverence of woods and groves : devotion 
has fled to their recesses for the performance of her most 
solemn rites ; princes have chosen the embowering shade of 
some wide-spreading tree, under which to receive the depu- 
tations of the neighbouring " great ones of the earth ;" and 
angels themselves, it is recorded, have not disdained to deliver 
their celestial messages beneath the same verdant canopy. 
To sit under the shadow of his own Gg-tree, and drink of the 
fruit of his own vine, is the reward promised, in Holy Writ, 
to the righteous man; and the gratification arising from the 
sight of a favoured and long-remembered tree, is one enjoyed 
in common by the peer, whom it reminds, as its branches 



viii 



INTRODUCTrON. 



wave over his liead, whilst wandering in his hereditary 
domains, of the illustrious ancestors who may have seen it 
planted ; and by the peasant who recalls, as he looks on it 
in his way to his daily labours, the sports of his infancy round 
its venerable trunk, and regards it at once as his chronicler 
and land-mark. 

To perpetuate the remembrance and preserve the charac- 
teristics of some of these objects, in themselves so interesting, 
is the design of the Sylva Britannica : in the descrip- 
tions, therefore, which accompany the plates, it will be 
found, that although the minutia? of scientific detail and 
botanical definitions are omitted, as unnecessary, and even 
misplaced, in a work professing to be chiefly of a pictorial 
description, every circumstance of local connexion, or tra- 
ditional interest, has been carefully attended to ; and the 
Author will be sufficiently gratified, should his performance 
impart to the minds of those who may favour it with their 
attention, even a small portion of the pleasure which he 
has himself experienced, whilst haunting the woods and 
forests, intent on delineating those varieties and pecu- 
liarities of their noblest productions, which he has endea- 
voured to transfer to the following representations ; with as 
much of the spirit of Nature as he could command, and 
with all the truth which minute remark and faithful imita- 
tion may, hopes, lay claim to, without hazarding the 
imputation of undue presumption. 



THE OAK. 



Stabat in his ingens annoso robore quercus ; 

Una nenius. OviD. 

In aged majesty a mighty Oak 

Towers o'er the subject trees, itself a grove. 



The Oak, admirable alike for its beauty and utility, 
has ever been distinguished as the glory of the 
forest ; over all the trees of which it may be con- 
sidered to reign with undisputed sway, both in 
importance and longevity. The earliest mention 
that is made of this tree is in Holy Writ : That 
ancient of days the " Oak of Mamre," under which 
Abraham sat in the heat of the day, and which, we 
are told, "remained an object of veneration even in 
the time of Constantine." We are informed also 
that Saul was buried beneath the Oak in the 
valley of Jabesh — a more desirable mausoleum than 
the kings of Egypt afterwards raised for themselves 
in their pyramids. 

The Oak was held sacred by the Greeks, the 
Romans, the Gauls, and the Britons. Among the 

A 



2 



SYLVA BRITANNTCA. 



Romans, it was dedicated to Jupiter ; among the 
ancient Britons, its consecrated shade was devoted 
to the most solemn ceremonies of the Druids ; and 
scarcely is it held in less veneration by their de- 
scendants, who find all the interest of which it may 
be despoiled by the passing away of the supersti- 
tions connected with it in former ages, revived in 
those present to them, by the ideas of British 
power, and British independence, inseparably asso- 
ciated with the image of the British Oak in the 
minds of Englishmen ; who see in every acorn that 
drops from its branching arms. 

Those sapling Oaks which at Britannia's call 
May heave their trunks mature into the main, 
And float the bulwarks of her liberty. 

Mason. 

In proportion as the Oak is valued above all other 
trees, so is the English Oak esteemed above that 
of any other country, for its particular character- 
istics of hardness and toughness ; qualities which 
so peculiarly fit it to be the " father of ships," and 
which are thus admirably expressed in two epithets 
by that great poet, to whom the book of Nature, 
and of the human heart, seemed alike laid open. 

Thou rather with thy sharp and sulph'rous bolt, 
Splitt'st the tmwedgeable and gnarled Oak, 
Than the soft myrtle. 

Shakspeare. 



THE OAK. 



3 



The Oak is to be found in all soils; its growth, 
however, greatly depends on the nature of that 
wherein it may be planted ; for though the hardi- 
ness of its infancy is such as to render choice or 
care apparently unnecessary, yet as it advances 
towards maturity, the depth and extent to which it 
strikes its roots, make much of both its magnitude 
and vigour depend on the congenial and uninter- 
rupted field it may find for its powers. That it ve- 
getates very rapidly under favorable circumstances, 
may be seen in the instance adduced by Gilpin, 
of an acorn which was sown at Beckett, the seat 
of Lord Barrington, on the day of his lordship's 
birth in 1717, and which, in November 1790, 
contained ninety-five feet of timber, and was more 
than eight feet in girth, at five feet from the ground. 
It is stated by Mr. South, in his ingenious essay 
on the Age and Growth of Trees, that an oak 
of sixty years standing will, in twenty-four years, 
double its contents of timber; a piece of informa- 
tion which may often check the progress of the 
axe that would otherwise be prematurely hurled 
at the fair heads of the infant hamadryads, by the 
reckless hand of avarice, a passion very apt, like 
"vaulting ambition," to "o'erleap itself," in its 
eager anticipation of emolument. An Irish writer 
on planting, mentions, with much regret, his being 
an eye-witness to the fall of nearly two hundred 
acres of beautiful thriving oaks in a romantic val- 



4 



SYLVA BRITANNTCA. 



ley in Wicklow, three times within the space of 
twenty-four years ; the produce of each sale never 
exceeding one hundred pounds, and one amounting 
only to fifty pounds ; when, had the same wood been 
preserved for an equal number of years, it would 
have produced, at the very lowest valuation, six 
thousand pounds instead of fifty. It is when stand- 
ing singly that the natural character of trees is seen : 
that of the Oak is rather to extend its arms, than 
elevate its head ; and in this situation its timber is 
more valuable than when it is in groups ; being more 
compact and firm, better bent, and every way more 
adapted for ship-building, the most precious of all 
its purposes ; though even in this respect the in- 
genuity of modern art supplies the operations of 
nature, and the discovery of warping timber by 
steam for the knees and other bent timbers of vessels 
renders its growth a matter of less importance than it 
would otherwise be : the tall Oaks are certainly 
more profitable for beams and planking ; and in 
sheltered groups they will reach an elevation of 
eighty or a hundred feet before they begin to decay. 
Mr. Rooke mentions one in Welbeck Park, known 
by the name of " the Duke's Walking- Stick," since 
blown down, which was one hundred and eleven feet 
six inches in height, being higher than the roof of 
Westminster Abbey. It is not, however, from these 
Goliahs of the forest that the painter would draw his 
beau ideal of sylvan forms, any more than from similar 



THE OAK. 



5 



proportions in the human race. There are so many 
points of view in which remarkable and well-known 
trees are interesting, either for their beauty in their 
prime, their venerableness in their decay, or the 
associations connected with them, as linked with 
historical recollections, that it is matter of regret 
to think how few of those which are chronicled 
as deserving of admiration have been secured to 
remembrance by the pencil- Who can hear of 
Alfred's Oak, or Chaucer's Oak, without regretting 
that not even an outline of them is in existence, for 
fancy to fill up, with the enthusiasm their names in- 
spire ? But independently of all other consideration, 
trees afford such delightful individuality, joined with 
such exquisite variety of character, and bring with 
them so many charming and hallowed associations 
of liberty and peace, of rural enjoyment or con- 
templative solitude, of the sports of childhood or 
the meditations of old-age, — -in short, of all that can 
refresh or exalt the soul, — that it is wonderful they 
have not hitherto been more decided objects of 
interest to the painter and the amateur, than merely 
what may arise from their introduction, rather as 
accidents in pictorial delineation, than as pictures 
in themselves : yet what can afford more delightful 
contrast in landscape than the giant strength of 
the Oak, with the flexile elegance of the ash ; the 
stately tranquillity of the elm, with the tremulous 
lightness of the poplar; the bright and varied foliage 



6 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



of the beech, or sycamore, with the funereal majesty 
of the cedar or the yew ; all differing in form and 
character, as in colour : 

*' No tree in all the grove but has its charms. 
And each its charui peculiar." 

COWPER. 

To a casual observer it may appear, that the view of 
one tree is much like the view of another ; and that 
a forest itself is more calculated to strike the imagi- 
nation, by the greatness of its aggregate, than to 
interest it by the variety of its detail ; but it is very 
different with the ardent contemplatist of Nature ; 
with him, as is well observed by St. Pierre, himself 
an unwearied admirer of her charms, " every tree 
has its individual character, and every group its 
harmony." Every winding branch, and every shoot- 
ing stem, has a charm for him ; and he is interested 
throughout each stage of the existence of these 
wonderful vegetable structures, from the tender sap- 
ling to the leafless withered trunk. 



THE GREAT OAK OF PANSHANGER 

is a fine specimen of the Oak in its prime. The 
epithet of Great was attached to it more than a 
century ago ; it appears, however, even now to have 
scarcely reached its meridian : the waving lightness 



THE OAK. 



7- 



of its feathered branches, dipping down, towards its 
stem, to the very ground, the straightness of its 
trunk and the redundancy of its foliage, all give it a 
character opposite to that of antiquity ; and fit it 
for the cultivated and sequestered pleasure-grounds 
which form part of the domain of Earl Cowper, 
at Panshanger, in Hertfordshire ; where it stands 
surrounded with evergreens and lighter shrubs, of 
which it seems at once the guardian and the pride. 
It is nineteen feet in circumference at three feet 
from the ground, and contains one thousand feet 
of timber. On looking at an object at once so 
graceful and so noble, raising its green head to- 
wards the skies, rejoicing in the sun-shine, and 
imbibing the breath of Heaven at every pore, we 
cannot but feel equal wonder and admiration when 
we consider the tininess of its origin, the slender- 
ness of its infant state, and the daily unfolding 
powers of its imperceptible, yet rapid, progress. " So 
it is," says Evelyn, that great and good man, and 
most accomplished scholar, whose name it is de- 
lightful to mention with the respect due to it, in 
the very outset of a work connected with the Sylvan 
subjects, which he so much enjoyed and so ably 
illustrated ; so it is that our tree, like man, whose 
inverted symbol he is, being sown in corruption 
rises in glory, and by little and little ascending into 
one hard erect stem of comely dimensions, becometh 
a solid tower, as it were. And that this, which but 



8 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



lately a single ant could easily have borne to his 
little cavern, should now become capable of resist- 
ing the fury, and braving the rage of the most im- 
petuous storms, — mag7ii meherch artificis, clausisse 
totum in tarn eariguo, et horror est consider anii. 

" For their preservation Nature has invested the 
w^hole tribe and nation, as we may say, of vege- 
tables, with garments suitable to their naked and 
exposed bodies, temper, and climate. Thus some are 
clad with a coarser skin, and resist all extremes of 
weather ; others with more tender and delicate skins 
and scarfs, as it were, and thinner raiment. Quid 
foUorum describam diversitates? What shall we say 
of the mysterious forms, variety, and variegation of 
the leaves and flowers, contrived with such art, yet 
without art ; some round, others long, oval, multan- 
gular, indented, crisped, rough, smooth and polished, 
soft and flexible ; quivering at every tremulous blast, 
as if it would drop in a moment, and yet so obsti- 
nately adhering, as to be able to contest against the 
fiercest winds that prostrate mighty structures! 
There it abides till God bids it fall : for so the wise 
Disposer of things has placed it, not only for orna- 
ment, but use and protection both of body and fruit, 
from the excessive heat of summer, and colds of the 
sharpest winters, and their immediate impressions ; 
as we find it in all such places and trees, as, like 
the blessed and good man, have always fruit upon 
them ripe, ox preparing to mature. 



THE OAK. 



9 



" Let us examine with what care the seeds, — those 
little souls of plants, quorum eiilitas, as one says, vLv 
locum inveniat, in which the whole and complete 
tree, though invisible to our dull sense, is yet per- 
fectly and entirely wrapped up, — exposed as they 
seem to be, to all those accidents of weather, storms, 
and rapacious birds, are yet preserved from viola- 
tion, diminution, and detriment, within their spiny, 
armed, and compacted receptacles, where they sleep, 
as in their causes, till their prisons let them gently 
fall into the embraces of the earth, now made preg- 
nant with the season, and ready for another burden : 
for at the time of year she fails not to bring them 
forth. With what delight have I beheld this ten- 
der and innumerable offspring repullulating at the 
feet of an aged tree ! from whence the suckers 
are drawn, transplanted, and educated by human 
industry ; and forgetting the ferity of their nature, 
become civilized to all his employments. 

" But I cease to expatiate farther on these wonders, 
that I may not anticipate the pleasures with which 
the serious contemplator on those stupendous works 
of Nature, or rather God of Nature, will find himself 
even rapt and transported, were his contemplations 
only applied to the production of a single wood." 

It is in this spirit that woods and groves should 
ever be visited ; it is feelings like these that restore 
them to their original representation of a verdant 
Paradise, planted by God himself, for man therein 



10 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



to hold communion with him, and delight in the 
innocent enjoyment of his bounties ! But to return 
from generals to particulars. The Panshanger Oak, 
as we have seen, is characterised by elegance ; if 
we wish to study the attribute of strength, by which 
the lord of the woods is more peculiarly distin- 
guished, we need only turn our eyes to 

THE WOTTON OAK, 

in the park of Wotton under Bernwood, a seat 
belonging to his Grace the Duke of Buckingham. 
It measures twenty-five feet in circumference, at one 
foot from the ground, and at the height of twelve 
feet divides into four large limbs, the principal of 
which is fifteen feet in circumference. It rises to 
an elevation of about ninety feet, and covers an area 
of fifty yards in diameter with its branches, recalling, 
to the mind of the spectator, Virgil's magnificent 
description of a similar object : 

quae, quantum vertice ad auras 

^therias, tantuiu radice in Tartara tendit. 
Ergo non hyemes illam, non flabra, neque imbres 
Convellunt : immota manet, multosque nepotes, 
Multa virum volvens durando saecula vincit. 
Turn fortes late ramos et brachia tendens 
Hue illuc, media ipsa ingentem sustinet umbram. 



whose roots descend 

As low towards Pluto's realms, as high in air 




I 



THE OAK. 



11 



Its massive branches rise. The utmost rage 
Of wintry storms howls o'er its strength in vain. 
Successive generations of mankind, 
Revolving ages, flourish and decay. 
Yet still immoveable it stands, and throws 
Its vigorous limbs around, and proudly bears 
With firm and solid trunk its stately form, 
A mighty canopy of thickest shade. 

Virgil, Georg. ii. 291. 

With full as much truth of nature, though with 
less pomp of diction, is the Oak described, flourishing, 
vigorous, rejoicing among his peers, in the following 
lines of Dan Chaucer," the father of our verse, 
the " pure well of English undefiled ; " from which 
so many succeeding bards have drank their first 
draughts of poetic inspiration : 

• " A plesaunt grove . . . 

In which were Okis grete, streight as a line, 
Undir the which the grass so freshe of hew 
Was newly sprong, and an eight fote, or nine. 
Every tree well fro his fellow grew. 
With braunches brode, ladin with levis new, 
That, sprongin out agen, the sonn^ shene. 
Some very rede ; and some a glad light grene." 

Chaucer : — The Floure and the Leafe. 

Perhaps, there is no where to be found so fine an 
illustration of the extent to which the oak will throw 
its broad arms and leafy canopies, when unintruded 
upon by other stems, as in — 



12 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE CHANDOS OAK, 



which stands in the pleasure-grounds of Michendon 
House, at Southgate, the property of His Grace the 
Duke of Buckingham, Its girth at one foot from 
the ground is eighteen feet three inches; at three 
feet, it is fifteen feet nine inches. The height of 
the stem to the branches is eight feet ; and at that 
distance from the ground it is seventeen feet in girth. 
It is sixty feet in height, and the extremity of its 
boughs includes a line of one hundred and eighteen 
feet. It is in this last particular that its great 
attraction consists. When it is in the full pride of 
its foliage, it strikes the spectator with sensations 
similar to those inspired by the magnificent Banyan 
trees of the East. Its boughs bending to the 
earth, with almost artificial regularity of form and 
equidistance from each other, give it the appearance 
of a gigantic tent ; with verdant draperies, drawn 
up to admit the refreshing breezes that curl the 
myriads of leaves which form altogether a mass of 
vegetable beauty and grandeur, scarcely to be 
equalled by any other production of the same 
nature in the kingdom. It is a magnificent living 
canopy — nuUi penetrabilis astro — impervious to the 
day. If, however, in the full pride of summer, this 
tree presents so refreshing a spectacle of breathing 



THE OAK. 



13 



coolness, and amplitude of shade, it affords a still 
more singular and striking one in the invigorating 
sharpness of an autumnal morning ; when its thou- 
sand boughs, and every pendent tw^ig, are gemmed 
with crystals, reflecting the rays which no longer 
scorch, and dazzle only to please. The following 
lines, inspired by contemplating it under this aspect, 
and written beneath the branches thus clothed in 
icicles, whose brief glories were rapidly melting 
away before an ascending sun, will not, it is pre- 
sumed, be unacceptable to the lover of fanciful 
imagery and harmonious numbers. 

Were now my spirit lapp'd in dreaming mood, 

I verily might think, majestic tree! 

That I, Louisa near, in company 
Of some most fair and beauteous Naiad stood 
In her own temple, 'neath the fountain flood ; 

In her own temple, roof 'd all gorgeously 

With gem and chrysolite — or I might be 
Embower'd with Fairy-queen in magic wood, 
The small leaves raining down a silver light. 
About our couch — or, under ceiling bright, 

Starr'd with the twinklings of ten thousand eyes, 

Such as illume the Houri's paradise ; 
Or else — but ah ! so wondrous fair the sight. 

That fancy in the unfinish'd effort dies ! 



1 



14 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE SQUITCH BANK OAK 

also is in its full vigour and beauty. Its "circum- 
ference at the roots is forty-three feet ; and at five 
feet high it is twenty-one feet nine inches. It is 
thirty-three feet in height to the crown; and 
twenty-eight feet above ; in all sixty-one feet. The 
butt contains six hundred and sixty feet nine inches 
of timber ; the principal limb seventy-nine feet six 
inches ; and the other limbs, fourteen in number, 
two hundred and seventy-two feet seven inches ; 
making its total contents one thousand and twelve 
feet seven inches of solid timber. 

This majestic tree stands in Bagot's Park, about 
four miles from Blithfield, near Litchfield, the seat 
of the Right Honorable Lord Bagot ; who may be 
regarded as one of the greatest encouragers of Oak 
timber in the kingdom, having planted two millions 
of acorns on his estates in Staffordshire and Wales ; 
which display, on every side, scenes of sylvan 
beauty and grandeur that can scarcely be sur- 
passed. Bagot's Park, in particular, abounds with 
rich and graceful variety of scenery. The gardens 
bloom with a thousand sweets ; the birds warble 
among them in notes of gratitude to the fresh and 
balmy air. The lawns, clothed with oaks and 
clumps of trees, exhibit the most soft and delicious 



THE OAK. 



15 



verdure, and present at every turn splendid views 
over a rich and woody country. The Park itself 
abounds with magnificent and ancient timber ; and 
is bordered with the romantic cliffs that rise on the 
banks of the river Dove. The stilness of antique 
trees and forest glades is relieved by animated 
groups of red deer, whose characteristics peculiarly 
suit the features of the scene, and by a yet more 
striking race of wild goats, originally presented by 
Richard the Second to one of Lord Bagot's an- 
cestors. It was amid scenes so inspiring and de- 
lightful, and under the encouraging influence of 
attentions from their noble owner, of which he must 
always retain a grateful remembrance, that the 
Author of this work made his first sketch for it, 
well pleased, as Horace has expressed it — 

" Taciturn sylvas inter reptare salubres :" 

And he trusts he shall not be accused of an undue 
degree of egotism, if he so far yields to the impulse 
of his feelings, as to acknowledge in this place the 
gratification he has derived from finding his attempt 
to form a national record of some of the principal 
Forest Trees that peculiarly ornament England 
above all other countries, so generously received by 
the public, as well as by the distinguished indi- 
viduals from whose domains his subjects have been 
principally taken. 



16 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE BEGGAR'S OAK 

is a fine sample of the real Park Oak, unpruned, 
unpollarded, throwing its broad arms around in all 
the freedom and majesty of its nature. It is sup- 
posed to have received its name from the accommo- 
dation it is so w^ell calculated to afford in its ample 
canopy, " star- proof," and its moss-grown roots, 
to the weary mendicants who may in former times 
have been tempted to seek the shade of its branches 
for repose or shelter. Its girth at five feet from the 
ground is twenty feet ; the circumference of the 
roots which project above the surface of the ground 
is sixty-eight feet, and the branches extend about 
sixteen yards from the trunk in every direction. It 
contains by admeasurement eight hundred and 
seventy-seven cubic feet of timber, which, including 
the bark, would have produced, at a price offered 
for it in 1812, the sum of £202. 14^. 9d. But this 
noble tree, as well as many other of the " giants of 
the forest," with which Bagot's Park abounds, are 
secure from the axe, under the protection of their 
present munificent proprietor; who best shows his 
sense of the value of the woody domains received 
from his ancestors, by endeavouring to secure the 
same gratification to his posterity ; annually planting 
a large portion of his estates, with a taste and zeal 



THE OAK. 



17 



which well deserve to be imitated, by all such landed 
proprietors as may be actuated by a laudable am- 
bition to make their private possessions a source of 
public ornament and of national wealth. And that 
appeals may not be wanting to self-love, as well as 
to considerations of the welfare of posterity, let us 
hear what is said on the subject by Evelyn, whose 
own green and prosperous old-age verified the truth 
of his remarks : " And now, lastly, to encourage those 
to plant that have opportunity, and those who inno- 
cently and with reluctance are forced to cut down, 
and endeavour to supply the waste with their utmost 
industry. It is observed that such planters are 
often blessed with health and old-age. Of their 
extraordinary longevity we have given abundant in- 
stances in this discourse ; and it seems to be so 
universally remarked, that as Paulus Venetus, that 
great traveller, reports, the Tartarian astrologers 
affirm nothing contributes more to men's long lives 
than the planting of many trees. Hmc Scripsi 
OcTAGENARius ; and shall, if God protract my 
years, and continue my health, be continually plant- 
ing, till it shall please him to trans])lant me into 
those glorious regions above, the celestial Paradise, 
planted with perennial groves and trees, bearing 
immortal fruit ; for such is the tree of life, which 
they who do his commandments have right to." 
Sylva, p. 645. 

Having thus far dwelt on the Oak in its vigour 

B 



18 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



and maturity, we must next consider it in the pe- 
riod, far more' interesting to the painter, the poet, 
or the moralist—of its decay. Who can look upon 
an object like 

THE SALCEY FOREST OAK, 

without feeling contemplations awakened in his 
breast, on the vicissitudes of ages, and the perish- 
able nature of all created forms ; which must, for 
the moment at least, elevate his thoughts to higher 
states of existence, where good cannot deteriorate, 
and is secure of endurance. 

Salcey Forest is in Northamptonshire ; between 
the forests of Rockingham on the North, and of 
Whittlebury on the South-west, by which the wood- 
land part of that county is divided into three main 
parcels. Of these Salcey Forest is the smallest; 
being not more than a mile in breadth, and scarcely 
a mile and a half in length : but its verdant appear- 
ance, enlivened by the variety of spreading thorns, 
which spring among its majestic Oaks, renders it, 
particularly in the beginning of the summer, when 
they put forth their white blossoms, and scent the 
air with their fragrance, a delightful haunt for the 
lovers of sylvan scenery. Camden speaks of it as a 
place set apart for game ; and even in the present 
day, its numerous troops of fallow deer, its tempting 



THE OAK. 



19 



copses, and picturesque herds of cattle, give it an 
animation not less attractive to the sportsman than 
to the painter. 

The Oak which maintains so proud a pre-eminence 
over all its brethren in this forest, w^as, in 1794, 
according to the account of H. Rooke, Esq. F.S.A., 
in circumference at the bottom, where there are no 
projecting spurs, forty-six feet ten inches ; at one 
yard from the ground, thirty-nine feet ten inches ; 
at two yards, thirty-five feet nine inches ; at three 
yards, thirty-five feet. Circumference within the 
trunk, near the ground, twenty-nine feet ; at one 
yard from the bottom, twenty-four feet seven inches ; 
at two yards, eighteen feet six inches ; at three yards, 
sixteen feet two inches. The height within the 
hollow was at that time fourteen feet eight inches, 
and the height of the tree itself, on the outside to the 
top branch, thirty-nine feet three inches. Of its 
age, a calculation may be formed from the fol- 
lowing observations of the ingenious Thomas South, 
Esq., communicated in his fourth Letter on the 
Growth of Oaks, addressed to the Bath Society. 
Speaking of an ancient hollow tree, the Bull Oak, 
on Oakly Farm, he informs us, that about twenty 
years before the time of his writing, 1783, he 
had the curiosity to measure this tree. " Its 
head," he proceeds to relate, " was as green and 
vigorous last summer, as it was at that time ; and 
though hollow as a tube, it has increased in its 



20 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



measure, some inches. Upon the whole, this bears 
every mark of having been a short-stemmed, 
branchy tree, of the first magnitude ; spreading its 
arms in all directions round it. Its aperture is a 
small, ill-formed gothic arch, hewn out, or enlarged 
with an axe, and the bark now curls over the 
wound — a sure sign that it continues growing : and 
hence it is evident, that the hollow oaks of enormous 
size recorded by antiquaries, did not obtain such 
bulk whilst sound ; for the shell increases when the 
substance is no more. The blea, and the inner 
bark, receive annual tributes of nutritious particles, 
from the sap, in its progress to the leaves ; and from 
thence acquire a power of extending the outer bark, 
and increasing its circumference slowly. Thus a 
tree, which at three hundred years old was sound, 
and five feet in diameter, like the Langley Oak, 
would, if left to perish gradually, in its thousandth 
year become a shell of ten feet diameter." 

" Hence," says Mr. Rooke, " we find by this 
curious investigation of the growth of Oaks, that a 
tree of about thirty feet in circumference may be 
supposed to have attained the age of a thousand 
years. Upon this calculation we may conclude, 
that the Great Salcey Forest Oak, which is only 
within two inches of forty-seven feet in circum- 
ference, cannot be less than fifteen hundred years 
old." It is equally probable that it should be more. 
Mr. Marsham calculated the Bentley Oak to be 



THE OAK. 



21 



fifteen hundred years old, when it was four hundred 
and eight inches in circumference ; whereas the 
Salcey Forest Oak is, as we see, five hundred and 
sixty-two. 

The following lines, written by Cowper on the 
Yardley Oak, may be applied, with equal truth, to 
the Salcey Forest Oak, as a proof how closely the 
descriptive powers of poetry may compete with the 
imitative ones of painting, to present an object to 
the mind with the most exact fidelity of nature : 

" Embowell'd now, and of thy ancient self 
Possessing nought but the scoop'd rind that seems 
An huge throat, calling to the clouds for drink, 
Which it would give in rivulets to thy root, 
Thou temptest none, but rather much forbidd'st 
The feller's toil, which thou could'st ill requite. 
Yet is thy root secure, sound as the rock ; 
A quarry of stout spars and knotted fangs. 
Which, crook'd into a thousand whimsies, clasp 

The stubborn soil, and hold thee still erect. 

■* * * * * * * 

Thine arms have left thee, winds have rent them oft" 

Long since; and rovers of the forest wild, 

With bow and shaft, have burnt them. Some have left 

A splinter'd stump, bleach'd to a snowy white ; 

And some memorial none, where once they grew. 

Yet life still lingers in thee, and puts forth 

Proof, not contemptible, of wiiat she can. 

Even where death predominates. The spring 

Finds thee not less alive to her sweet force, 

That yonder upstarts of the neighbouring wood, 

So much thy juniors ; who their birth receiv'd 

Half a millennium since the date of thine." Cowper. 



22 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE BULL OAK 

in Wedgenock Park, Warwickshire, is the property 
of the Earl of Warwick. "Bull-Oaks," says Mr. 
South, whose remarks on the growth of Oaks, as 
elicited by his observations on this tree, we have 
just given, " are thus denominated from the no un- 
common circumstance of bulls taking shelter within 
them ; which these animals effect, not by going in 
and turning round, but by retreating backwards 
into the cavity, till the head, only, projects at the 
aperture. The one I am about to particularize stands 
in the middle of a pasture, bears the most venerable 
marks of antiquity, gives the name compounded 
of itself and its situation to the farm on which it 
grows, viz. Oakly Farm, and was the favourite retreat 
of a bull. Twenty people, old and young, have 
crowded into it at a time ; a calf being shut up there 
for convenience, its dam, a two-year-old heifer, 
constantly went in to suckle it, and left sufficient 
room for milking her. It is supposed to be near a 
thousand years old ; the body is nothing but a shell, 
covered with burly protuberances ; the upper part 
of the shaft is hollow like a chimney ; it has been 
mutilated of all its limbs, but from their stumps 
arise a number of small branches, forming a bushy 
head, so remarkable for fertility, that in years of 
plenty it has produced two sacks of acorns in a sea- 



THE OAK. 23 

son." The dimensions of this venerable remnant of 
antiquity are, at one yard from the ground, eleven 
yards one foot ; one foot above the ground, thirteen 
yards one foot ; six feet from the ground, twelve 
yards one foot ; broadest side, seven yards five 
inches ; close to the ground, eighteen yards, one 
foot, seven inches ; height of the trunk about four 
yards one foot. 

The following lines, from Spenser, describe its 
present condition so admirably, that they may well 
be admitted as an adjunct to the pencil which has 
endeavoured to delineate it : 

There grew an aged tree on the green, 
A goodly Oak some time had it been, 
With arms full long, and largely display'd. 
But of their leaves they were disarray 'd ; 
The body big, and mightily pight, 
Thoroughly rooted, and of wondrous height : 
Whilom had been the king of the field, 
And mochel mast to the husband did yield ; 
And with his nuts larded many swine. 
But now the gray moss marred his rine ; 
His bared boughs were beaten with storms. 
His top was bald and wasted with worms ; 
His honour decay 'd, his branches sere. 

Shepherd's Calendar. 



24 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE SWILCAR LAWN OAK 

stands in Needwood Forest, in Staffordshire. It is 
known, by historical documents, to be more than 
six hundred years old ; and it is still far from being 
in the last stage of decay. Its girth, at the height 
of six feet from the ground, is twenty-one feet four 
inches and a half. Fifty-four years ago it was 
girthed in the same place, by a labouring man still 
living, and measured at that time nineteen feet. It 
is a magnificent tree, and has the advantage of 
looking fully as large as it really is. " Few per- 
sons," says Mr. Burgess, in his interesting remarks 
on the Oak, "save those to whom habit has ren- 
dered it familiar, form any thing like just estimates 
of the veritable size of trees. The situations in 
which they are commonly seen, harmonizing with 
the illimitable expanse of heaven, and the wildest 
extent of forest scenery, or of mountain heights, 
lessen, ideally, their intrinsic bulk ; nor is it till sin- 
gled from the surrounding landscape, nor even then, 
until the theodolite and rule proclaim their sums, 
that we become persuaded of their vast extent : 
nay, figures themselves, to the generality of the 
world, convey but imperfect conceptions of length 
and breadth, and height and girth. Some more fa- 
miliar representatives are wanted to prove that a 
majestic tree, which is only in moderate proportion, 
as an ornament to nature in the country, is really 



THE OAK. 



25 



an enormous mass, and would show as a large and 
glorious structure among the dwellings and palaces 
of man in town." 

The Swilcar Lawn Oak has been celebrated in 
poetic strains by several modern bards; among whom 
may be particularized Mr. Mundy, whose mention 
of it, in his poem of " Needwood Forest," drew 
forth the following elegant compliment to himself, 
and animated apostrophe to the venerable subject 
of his verse, from the pen of Dr. Darwin : — ■ 

" Hail, stately Oak ! whose wrinkled trunk hath stood, 
Age after age, the sov'reign of the wood ; 
You, who have seen a thousand springs unfold 
Their ravell'd buds, and dip their flowers in gold ; 
Ten thousand times yon moon re-light her horn. 
And that bright eye of evening gild the morn ! 

Say, when of old the snow-hair'd druids pray'd 
With mad-eyed rapture in yon hallow'd shade, 
While to their altars bards and heroes throna. 
And crowding nations join the ecstatic song; 
Did e'er such dulcet notes arrest your gales, 
As Mundy pours along the list'ning vales ? 

" Yes, stately Oak, thy leaf-wrapp'd head sublime. 
Ere long must perish in the wrecks of time ; 
Should o'er thy brow the thunders harndess break, 
And thy firm roots, in vain, the whirlwinds shake. 
Yet must thou fall : — thy with'ring glories sunk, 
Arm after arm shall leave thy mould'ring trunk ! 
But Mundy 's verse shall consecrate thy name. 
And rising forests envy Swilcar's fame ; 
Green shall thy germs expand, thy branches play, 
And bloom for ever in th' immortal lay." 



26 



SYLV/V BRITANNIC A. 



THE MOCCAS PARK OAK 



is thirty-six feet in circumference, at three feet from 
the ground ; it stands in the Park of Moccas Court, 
on the banks of the Wye, in Herefordshire ; the 
seat of Sir George Amyand Cornewall, Bart., who 
traces his ancestry from Richard, second son of 
King John, Earl of Cornwall, and King of the Ro- 
mans. The whole estate, from the very nature of 
its situation, forming part of the borders between 
England and Wales, is fraught with historical asso- 
ciations, which extend themselves, with pleasing 
interest, to this ancient " monarch of the wood," 
among whose boughs the war-cry has often rever- 
berated in former ages, and who has witnessed 
many a fierce contention, under our Henries and our 
Edwards, hand to hand and foot to foot, for the do- 
mains on which he still survives, in venerable, though 
decaying majesty, surrounded by aged denizens of 
the forest, the oldest of whom, nevertheless, com- 
pared with himself, seem but as of yesterday. The 
stilness of the scene, at the present time, forms a 
soothing contrast to the recollections of the turbu- 
lent past ; and the following lines are so in harmony 
with the reflections it is calculated to awaken, that 
it is hoped the transplanting of them, from the p.ages 




I 



THE OAK. 



27 



of a brother amateur of the forests, to the page before 
us, will not displease either him or the reader : 

" Than a tree, a grander child earth bears not. 
What are the boasted palaces of man, 
Imperial city or triumphal arch, 
To forests of immeasurable extent. 
Which Time confirms, which centuries waste not ? 
Oaks gather strength for ages ; and when at last 
They wane, so beauteous in decrepitude. 
So grand in weakness ! E'en in their decay 
So venerable ! 'Twere sacrilege t' escape 
The consecrating touch of time. Time watched 
The blossom on the parent bough. Time saw 
The acorn loosen from the spray. Time passed 
While, springing from its swaddling shell, yon Oak 
The cloud-crown'd monarch of our woods, by thorns 
Environ'd, scaped the raven's bill, the tooth 
Of goat and deer, the schoolboy's knife, and sprang 
A royal hero from his nurse's arms. 
Time gave it seasons, and Time gave it years, 
Ages bestow'd, and centuries grudged not : 
Time knew the sapling when gay summer's breath 
Shook to the roots the infant Oak, which after 
Tempests moved not. Time hollow'd in its trunk 
A tomb for centuries : and buried there 
The epochs of the rise and fall of states, 
The fading generations of the world. 
The memory of man." 



28 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



THE KING OAK 

forms a conspicuous feature in Savernake Forest, 
one of the most interesting spots in the kingdom, to 
the lovers of wild wood scenery. Whilst exploring 
its tangled haunts and gazing on the massive trunks 
that every where throw their aged arms across his 
path, the imagination of the spectator wafts him 
back to the days of William the Conqueror, and all 
the vaunted privileges of the chase. It belongs to 
the Marquess of Aylesbury, and is almost the only 
forest in England in the hands of a subject ; by 
whom, in strict language, only a chase is tena- 
ble. The King Oak, its most venerable ornament, 
spreads its branches over a diameter of sixty yards, 
and is twenty-four feet in girth. The trunk is quite 
hollow, and altogether its age appears to warrant 
the idea that it may have witnessed in its infancy 
those rites and sacrifices of our Saxon ancestors 
which were held in these shadowy recesses, at once 
to increase their solemnity, and to shield them from 
the profane eyes of vulgar observers. Could this 
" eldest of forms" be questioned on its origin, we 
may imagine its reply in the often-quoted lines : 

" In my great grandsire's trunk did Druids dwell; 
My grandsire with the Roman Empire fell : 
Myself a sapling when my father bore 
Victorious Edward to the Gallic shore." 



THE OAK. 



29 



Gilpin rightly observes, that of all species of land- 
scape there is none which so universally captivates 
mankind as forest scenery. However the agricul- 
turist or the political economist may remind us, that 
our prosperity as a nation must increase in pro- 
portion as the plough and the scythe gain ground 
upon the woods, we still, as individuals, cling in ima- 
gination to those haunts of liberty and contem- 
plation, which afforded man his first shelter ; still 
delight in their endless variety of hues and forms, 
and vocal sounds ; and find ourselves alternately 
elevated by the solemnity of their solitudes, or 
cheered by the animation of the occupations and 
habits of the tribes connected with them. Out of 
ninety English forests, enumerated by Gilpin, how 
few remain as present ornaments and nurseries of 
future wealth ! Who would not be grieved to see 
such noble sylvan districts as the forests of Windsor 
and Marlborousfh denuded and laid waste — a scene 
of desolation, such as the site of a forest no longer a 
forest peculiarly exhibits ? We may be allowed, 
therefore, to lament, that " of all sublunary things, 
the woodland scene, which is amongst the most 
beautiful, should be among the most perishable : " 

" Woods 

Which shelter'd once the stag and gristly boar, 
Scarce to the timid hare now refuge lend." 

At a little distance from the King Oak is — 



30 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



THE CREEPING OAK, 

so called from the circumstance of one of its main 
limbs having crept so closely to the earth in its youth, 
that in its old age it actually reclines the weight of 
its increasing years upon the ground ; forming, in 
doing so, a pleasing irregularity of outline very agree- 
able to the eye of a painter, which naturally abhor- 
reth the idea of a straight line, as much as Descartes 
did that of a vacuum. Never were noble avenues 
and " alleys green " seen in more beauty than on 
the lovely day in autumn, when this sketch was 
made amid their variegated shades. " Every season 
has its peculiar product, and is pleasing or admirable 
from causes that variously affect our different tem- 
peraments or dispositions ; but there are accompani- 
ments in an autumnal morning's woodland walk, 
that call for all our notice and admiration : the pecu- 
liar feeling of the air, and the solemn grandeur of 
the scene around us, dispose the mind to contempla- 
tion and remark : there is a silence in which we hear 
everything: a beauty that will be observed. The 
stump of an old oak is a very landscape — with rugged 
alpine steeps bursting through forests of verdant 
mosses, with some pale denuded branchless lichen, 
like a scathed oak, creeping up the sides or crown- 
ing the summit. Rambling with unfettered grace. 



THE OAK. 



31 



the tendrils of the briary festoon, with its brilliant 
berries, green, red, yellow, the slender sprigs of the 
hazel or the thorn ; it ornaments their plainness, and 
receives a support its own feebleness denies. The 
agaric, with all its hues, its shades, its elegant 
variety of forms, expands its cone, sprinkled with 
the freshness of the morning ; a transient fair, a 
child of decay, that " sprang up in a night and will 
perish in a night." The squirrel, agile with life and 
timidity, gambolling round the root of an ancient 
beech, its base overgrown with the dewberry, blue 
with unsullied fruit, impeded in his frolic sports, 
half angry, darts up the silvery bole again, to peep 
and wonder at the strange intruder on his haunts. 
The jay springs up, and screaming, tells us of danger 
to her brood,^ — the noisy tribe repeat the call, — are 
hushed, and leave us. The loud laugh of the wood- 
pecker, joyous and vacant : the hammering of the 
nut-hatch, cleaving its prize in the chink of some 
dry bough : the humble bee, torpid on the disk of 
the purple thistle . . . Then falls the " sere and yel- 
low leaf," parting from its spray without a breeze 
tinkling in the boughs, and rustling, scarce audibly, 
along, rests at our feet and tells that we part too." — ■ 
Journal of a Naturalist, p. 117. 



32 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



THE GOSPEL OAK. 

The custom of making the boundaries of parishes, 
by the neighbouring inhabitants going round them 
once a-year, and stopping at certain spots to per- 
form different ceremonies, in order that the localities 
might be impressed on the memories of the young, 
as they were attested by the recollections of the old, 
is still common in various parts of the kingdom. 
The custom itself is of great antiquity, and is sup- 
posed by some to have been derived from the feast 
called Terminalia, v^^hich was dedicated to the God 
Terminus, who was considered as the guardian of 
fields and land-marks, and the promoter of friend- 
ship and peace among men. Its beneficial effects, 
and social influence, are thus described by Withers, 
in the quaint style of two centuries by-gone : — 

" That every man might keep his own possessions, 
Our fathers used, in reverent processions, 
(With zealous prayers, and with praiseful cheere,) 
To walk their parish limits once a-year ; 
And well-known marks (which sacrilegious hands 
Now cut or breake) so bordered out their lands, 
That every one distinctly knew his owne ; 
And many brawles now rife, were then unknowne." 

It was introduced among Christians about the 
year 800, by the pious Avitus, Bishop of Vienna, in 
a season of dearth and calamity, and has been con- 



THE OAK. 



33 



tinued since his time by the different clergy. The 
minister of each parish, accompanied by his church- 
wardens and parishioners, going round the bounds 
and limits of his parish in Rogation Week, or on one 
of the three days before Holy Thursday, (the feast 
of our Lord's Ascension,) and stopping at remarkable 
spots and trees, to recite passages from the Gospels, 
and implore the blessing of the Almighty on the fruits 
of the earth, and for the preservation of the rights and 
properties of the parish. The learned and excellent 
Andrews, Bishop of Winchester, left a fine model of 
prayer for these occasions ; and it must have been a 
-soothing sight to witness the devotional feelings of 
the multitude, thus called forth in the simplicity of 
patriarchal worship in the open air, and surrounded 
by the works of God. 

Maluit umbrosatn quercum : 

and it would be difficult to select a more fit object 
than the broad oak to mark their resting place, and 
to serve as an altar beside which to offer up their 
prayers ; as in times of yore the worshippers of God 
were wont to do, in their solemn groves, before 
temples made by hands were built to Him, and the 
place of His holy tabernacle fixed by His own divine 
revelation. 

Many of these Gospel trees are to be found in 
different parts of the country ; about Wolverhampton 
in particular, the boundaries and township of the 
parish are marked by them, and they are preserved 

c 



34 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



with the greatest care and attention. That they 
often possessed a double claim on the regard of the 
young, by being made the witnesses of vows not 
likely to be forgotten, we may gather from the plain- 
tive injunction Herrick puts into the mouth of one 
of his lovers, in his Hesperides : 

" Dearest, bury me 

Under that holy oke, or Gospel Tree ; 

Where, though thou see'st not, thou may'st think upon 

Me, when thou yeerly go'st Procession." 

The Gospel Oak near Stoneleigh stands in a little 
retired coppice, the solitude of which is equally 
favourable to thought and to devotion, to the reveries 
of the philosopher on ages past, and the contem- 
plation of the Christian on the ages to come. 

Lucos et ipsa silentia adoramus. 

In the fresh fields, His own Cathedral meet. 
Built by Himself, star-roof'd, and hung with green. 
Wherein all breathing things, in concord sweet, 
Organ'd by winds, perpetual hymns repeat." 

THE COWTHORPE OAK. 

This gigantic and venerable tree stands at the 
extremity of the village of Cowthorpe, near We- 
therby, in Yorkshire, in a retired field, sheltered 
on one side by the ancient church belonging to the 
place, and on another by a farm-house ; the rural 



THE OAK. 



35 



occupations of which exactly accord with the cha- 
racter of the Oak, whose aged arms are extended 
towards it with a peculiar air of rustic vigour, re- 
tained even in decay: like some aged peasant, 
whose toil-worn limbs still give evidence of the 
strength which enabled him to acquit himself of the 
labours of his youth. It is mentioned by the late 
Doctor Hunter, in his edition of Evelyn's Sylva ; in 
the following note on a passage respecting the ex- 
traordinary size of an Oak in Sheffield Park : " Nei- 
ther this, nor any of the Oaks mentioned by Mr. 
Evelyn, bear any proportion to one now growing at 
Cowthorpe, near Wetherby, upon an estate belong- 
ing to the Right Hon. Lady Stourton — the dimen- 
sions are almost incredible : within three feet of 
the surface it measures sixteen yards, and close by 
the ground twenty-six yards : its height in its pre- 
sent ruinous state (1776) is almost eighty-five feet, 
and its principal limb extends sixteen yards from 
the bole. Throughout the whole tree the foliage is 
extremely thin, so that the anatomy of the ancient 
branches may be distinctly seen in the height of 
summer. When compared to this, all other trees 
are but children of the Forest." — Book iii. page 500. 

According to this statement, it should appear that 
the Cowthorpe Oak was, at that time, ten feet more 
in girth than the Powis Oak in Bromfield Wood, 
near Ludlow, which measured sixty-eight feet round, 
and nearly forty feet more than the Swilcar Oak ; 



36 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



that is, more than double the size of that tree 
which, as already stated, there is reason to believe 
is upwards of six hundred years old, and four times 
and one-third as large as the old oak in Langley 
Woods, which tradition traced for upwards of a 
thousand years. In 1829 it was measured by the 
Rev. Thomas Jessop of Bilton Hall, who thus states 
the result in a letter to Mr. Burgess : " The Cow- 
thorpe or Calthorpe Oak is still in existence, though 
very much decayed : at present it abounds with 
foliage and acorns, the latter have long stalks, the 
leaves short ones. The dimensions of the tree, ac- 
cording to my measurement, are as follow : height 
forty-five feet, (little more than half what it was 
fifty-three years ago, and then its chief limbs had 
been destroyed ;) circumference close to the ground, 
(not including the projecting angles,) sixty feet ; 
ditto at one yard high, forty-five feet : extent of 
principal branch, fifty feet, (an increase of two feet 
in more than half a century ;) mean circumference 
of ditto, eight feet. I am inclined to think," adds 
he, " that the original dimensions of this venerable 
plant were those given in Evelyn's Sylva. The 
oldest persons in this neighbourhood speak of the 
tree as having been much higher ; and were we to 
take into account the angles at the base formed by 
projections from the trunk, the lower periphery 
might be made out twenty-six yards. It is said by 
the inhabitants of the village, that seventy persons 



THE OAK. 



37 



at one time got within the hollow of the trunk ; but, 
on inquiry, I found many of these were children ; 
and, as the tree is hollow throughout to the top, 
I suppose they sat on each other's shoulders : yet, 
without exaggeration, I believe the hollow capable 
of containing forty men." The area occupied by 
the Cowthorpe Oak, where the bottom of its trunk 
meets the earth, exceeds, as Mr. Burgess remarks, 
the ground-plot of that majestic column of which an 
Oak is confessed to have been the prototype ; namely,^ 
the Eddystone Light-house, raised by the ingenious 
architect, Mr. Smeaton, after a model drawn from 
an attentive study of the principles on which Nature 
enables her gigantic vegetable structures to with- 
stand, for centuries, the furious blasts that often lay 
prostrate in a moment the proudest works of man : 
sections of the stem of the one would, at several 
heights, nearly agree with sections of the curved and 
cylindrical portions of the shaft of the other ; and a 
chamber of equal extent, or larger than either of those 
in the light-house, might be hollowed out of its trunk. 
It is undoubtedly the largest tree at present known 
in the kingdom, and cannot be looked upon without 
veneration and regard. 

When the huge trunk whose bare and forked arms ^ 
Pierced the mid sky, now prone, shall bud no more, 
Still let the massy ruin, like the bones 
Of some majestic hero, be preserved 

Unviolated and revered 

Whilst the gray father of the vale, at eve. 



38 



SYLVA BKITANNICA. 



Returning from his sweltering summer task. 

To tend the new-mown grass, or raise the sheaves. 

Along the western slope of yon gay hill. 

Shall stop to tell his listening sons how far 

She stretch'd around her thick-leaved ponderous boughs, 

And measure out the space they shadowed." 

Davy. 

THE GREENDALE OAK. 
There is, perhaps, no spot in England where once 
were to be found so many ancient and magnificent 
Oaks as in the Park of Welbeck, in Nottinghamshire, 
one of the seats of his Grace the Duke of Portland ; 
insomuch that Mr. Rooke, a fellow of the Anti- 
quarian Society, and a great lover of forest sub- 
jects, thought them worthy, forty years ago, of a 
detailed account, wherein he gave the charac- 
teristics of many which have now laid their leafy 
honours low. But the Greendale Oak, however, 
still remains, little altered in its general aspect by 
the lapse of half a century since it was described 
as a ruin. In the year 1724, a road-way was 
cut through its venerable trunk, higher than the 
entrance to Westminster Abbey, and sufficiently 
capacious to permit a carriage and four horses to 
pass through it. A print of it was published at that 
time, in which it scarcely varies from its present 
appearance, excepting that the artist has sought to 
heighten the effect by choosing the moment when 
one of the old-fashioned equipages of the day, with 
its four long-tailed appendages was passing through 



V 



THE OAK. 



39 



the cavity. In 1790, Mr. Rooke gave the measure- 
ment of it as follows : — The circumference of the 
trunk above the arch, is thirty-five feet three inches ; 
height of the arch, ten feet three inches ; width 
about the middle, six feet three inches ; height to 
the top branch fifty-four feet. Evelyn, and after 
him Hunter, makes some slight variation in these 
measurements. Evelyn calculates that two hun- 
dred and twenty-five head of cattle might stand 
within the shadow of its branches ; but at the pre- 
sent day the herd must be indeed diminished if 
their owner should mean them to escape the heat of 
the meridian sun, from the shelter of its few remain- 
ing branches and thinly scattered foliage. It is 
no way surprising that this should be the case, as it 
appears that the loss of them, naturally attendant 
on the chances of elemental war, and the ravages of 
time, was anticipated from other causes ; among 
which may be reckoned the partiality of the Countess 
of Oxford to the tree, of which the family might 
well be proud, insomuch that she had, as Mr. Rooke 
informs us, " several cabinets made out of the 
branches, and ornamented with inlaid representa- 
tions of the oak, with the following inscriptions : 

Seepe sub hac Dryades festas duxere choreas : 
Saepe etiam, manibus nexis ex ordine, trunci 
CircuieiSe modum ; meusuraque roboris ulnas 
Quinque ter implebat ; nec non et cetera tanto 
Sylva sub hac, sylva quanto jacet herba sub omni." 

Ovid Met. 



40 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



" When all the woodland nyniplis their revels play'd, 
And footed sportive rings around its shade ; 
Not fifteen cubits could encompass round 
The ample trunk on consecrated ground; 
As much its height the other trees exceeds, 
As they o'ertop the grass and humbler weeds." 

" Lo the oake that hath so long a norishing 
Fro' the time that it ginneth first to spring, 
And hath so long a life, as we may see, 
Yet, at the last, wasted is the tree." 

ChAuckr. 

We will now, dismissing these venerable patriarchs 
of the forest, consider some of their brethren, which, 
if inferior to them in years and bulk, yet possess 
equal claims on notice, as being connected with 
names and incidents familiar in our historical records, 
or in the traditions of "olden times." The forests 
of " Merry England " have, from time immemorial, 
been the scene of bold adventure and romantic inci- 
dent ; from the period when the legions of Caesar 
disturbed the aged Druids in their secret rites, and 
the Roman axe invaded the pride of their solemn 
groves, to the time when the fate-directed arrow of 
Tyrrel, with retributive justice, smote his heedless 
and cruel-hearted prince : or to days still more 
recent, when the horn of the jovial outlaw, Robin 
Hood, resounded in the greenwood shade, and the 
adventures and exploits of that peerless wight, 
mingled with tales of monks, fair dames, chivalrous 
knights, and distressed damsels, were rife, and of 



THE OAK. 



41 



daily report in men's ears. Our early food was 
acorns ; and our very poetic existence is strangely 
blended with our oaks. Thor and Odin may dwell 
in their vast and dreary caverns of the North. A 
more beautiful and gentle race are the legendary 
tenants of our groves ; or Jonson and Shakspeare 
have belied their muse; and Chaucer has poured 
forth his descriptive melodies in vain. Even the 
grave and classic Milton, when he tells 

" Of forests and enchantments drear," 

departing from the time-hallowed superstitions of 
the Greek and Roman page, acknowledges 

" Each gentle habitant of grove and spring," 

and indulges his fancy on the subject of these popu- 
lar and romantic traditions, with an elegance and 
grace peculiarly his own : 

fairy elves. 

Whose midnight revels, by a forest side 

Or fountain, some belated peasant sees. 

Or dreams he sees, while over head the moon 

Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth 

Wheels her pale course ; they, on their mirth and dance 

Intent, with jocund music charm his ear : 

At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds." 

Paradise Lost, B. 1. 

But we must not be tempted, by fairy visions and 
poetic numbers, to stray too far from the more 
sober matter of our page ; we will therefore return 
to our original consideration of such trees as may 
be classed under the head of historical. These 



42 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



indeed would form a volume in themselves ; a 
Sylvan Chronicle of times past, did we undertake 
to mention all such as are rendered illustrious by 
the names of the great and good who have sheltered 
or meditated under their branches ; but our limits 
restrain us from more than a mere glance at features 
so interesting. 

THE SHELTON OAK, 

known familiarly in its neighbourhood by the appel- 
lation of *' Owen Glendower's Observatory," stands 
on the road-side, where the Pool road diverges from 
that which leads to Oswestry, about a mile and 
a half from Shrewsbury. The spires of that city 
form a pleasing object in the distance, whilst above 
them, the famous mountain called the Wrekin 
lifts its head, and inspires a thousand social re- 
collections, as the well-known toast, that includes 
all friends around its ample base, is brought to 
mind by the sight of its lofty summit. The appear- 
ance of the Shelton Oak, hollow throughout its 
trunk, and with a cavity towards the bottom ca- 
pable of containing at least half a score persons, ' 
sufficiently denotes its antiquity. Tradition informs 
us, that just before the famous battle of Shrews- 
bury, June 21, 1403, headed on one side by Henry 
the IVth in person, and on the other by the gallant 
Henry Percy, surnamed Hotspur, Owen Glendower, 



THE OAK. 



43 



the powerful Welch Chieftain, and the firm adherent 
of the English Insurgents, ascended this tree, and 
from its lofty branches, then most probably in the 
full pride of their vigour, reconnoitred the state of 
the field : when finding that the King was in great 
force, and that the Earl of Northumberland had not 
joined his son Henry, he descended from his leafy 
observatory, with the prudent resolution of declining 
the combat, and retreated with his followers to Os- 
westry. This caution seems scarcely in character 
with the fierce and heedless courage of 

•* The irregular and wild Glendower," 

whose martial daring is well pourtrayed by our 
great dramatic poet, in Hotspur's account of his 
combat with *' the noble Mortimer ; " of whom he 
says : 

To prove that true. 

Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds, 

Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took, 

When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank. 

In single opposition, hand to hand. 

He did confound the best part of an hour 

In changing hardiment with great Glendower. 

Three times they breathed, and three times did they drink. 

Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood ; 

Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks. 

Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds, 

And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank, 

Blood-stained with the valiant combatants." 

King H ENRY IV, 1st Part. Act 1. sc. 3. 



44 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



The great age of the Shelton Oak, thus pointed out 
by the tradition which connects it with the name of 
Glendower, is likewise attested by legal documents 
belonging to Richard Hill Waring, Esq., whose 
ancestors possessed lands in Shelton, and the neigh- 
bourhood, in the reign of Henry III. Among 
this gentleman's title-deeds is a paper, subscribed, 
" per me Adam Waring," and entitled, *' How the 
grette Oake at Shelton standeth on my grounde." 
Wherein is the following mention made of this Oak 
in 1543. 

" Farther he say the, that by cause the grounde 
whereby the said gret oke standeth is moche more 
nearer waye and handsom' onto the moost of the 
said filds of Shelton, m'ckett mylle, and moost of y 
c5venient places to resort to, and for that oon lande 
of grounde belongyng to my said house stode right 
and next to the folde southe east ende of my saide 
house — which said lande of grounde did lye and 
dothe streight upon the said gret oke," &c. 

The circumference of this tree at one foot and a 
half from the ground is thirty-seven feet, and at five 
feet from the ground it is twenty-six feet. 

QUEEN ELIZABETH'S OAK, 



with all its peculiar features and interesting tradition, 
is so admirably described by the writer with whose 



THE OAK. 



45 



lines we have concluded the account of the Cow- 
thorpe Oak, that little apology will be necessary 
for giving his own words ; particularly as the man- 
sion, in his graphic delineation of it, appears in such 
perfect keeping with the tree, that it would be 
equally repugnant to taste and good feeling to sepa- 
rate them : 

" You surprised me in saying, that you never 
heard of the tree called Queen Elizabeth's Oak, at 
Huntingfield, in Suffolk, till I mentioned it. As 
the distance from Aspal is not more than a morn- 
ing's airing, I wish you and your pupil would ride 
over to take a view of it. You may, at the same 
time, I believe, have an opportunity of seeing a very 
fine drawing of this grand object, which was made 
for Sir Gerard Vanneck, by Mr. Hearne. As 1 
measured it with that ingenious artist in a rough 
way, to settle, in some degree, the proportions of its 
bulk, it was found to be nearly eleven yards in cir- 
cumference, at the height of seven feet from the 
ground ; and, if we may conjecture from the con- 
dition of other trees of the same sort, in different 
parts of the kingdom, whose ages are supposed to 
be pretty well ascertained, from some historical cir- 
cumstances, I am persuaded this cannot be less than 
five or six hundred years old. 

" The time of growth in trees is generally said to 
be proportioned to the duration of their timber after- 
ward ; and I have now by me a piece of oak, taken 



46 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



from that side of the ruins of Framlingham Castle, 
which undoubtedly was part of the original building 
in the time of Alfred the Great, if not much earlier ; 
which, notwithstanding it had been exposed to the 
sun and rains for a century at least before I cut it 
out, yet it still smells woody, and appears to be as 
sound as when the tree was first felled. 

" The Queen's Oak at Hiintingfield was situated 
in a park of the Lord Hunsdon, about two bow-shots 
from the old mansion-house, where Queen Elizabeth 
is said to have been entertained by this nobleman, 
and to have enjoyed the pleasures of the chase in a 
kind of rural majesty. The approach to it was by a 
bridge, over an arm of the river Blythe, and, if 
I remember right, through three square courts. A 
gallery was continued the whole length of the 
building, which, opening upon a balcony over the 
porch, gave an air of grandeur, with some variety to 
the front. The great hall was built round six straight 
massy oaks, which originally supported the roof as 
they grew : upon these the foresters and yeomen of 
the guard used to hang their nets, cross-bows, 
hunting-poles, great saddles, calivers, bills, &c. 
The root of them had been long decayed when I 
visited this romantic dwelling ; and the shafts sawn 
off at bottom were supported either by irregular 
logs of wood driven under them, or by masonry. 
Part of the long gallery, where the Queen and her 
fair attendants used to divert themselves, was con- 



THE OAK. 



47 



verted into an immense cheese chamber ; and upon 
my first looking into it, in the dusk of a summer's 
evening, when a number of these huge circular 
things were scattered upon the floor, it struck me 
that the maids of honour had just slipped off their 
fardingales, to prepare for a general romping. 

" Elizabeth is reported to have been much pleased 
with the retirement of this park, which was filled 
with tall and massy timbers, and to have been 
particularly amused and entertained with the so- 
lemnity of its walks and bowers. But this oak, from 
which the tradition is that she shot a buck with her 
own hand, was her favourite tree. It is still in 
some degree of vigour, though most of its boughs 
are broken off", and those which remain are ap- 
proaching to a total decay, as well as its vast trunk : 
the principal arm, now bald with dry antiquity, shoots 
up to a great height above the leafage, and, being 
hollow and truncated at top, with several cracks 
resembling loop-holes, through which the light 
shines into its cavity, it gives us an idea of the 
winding staircase in a lofty Gothic turret, which, 
detached from the other ruins of some venerable 
pile, hangs tottering to its fall, and affects the 
mind of a beholder after the same manner, by its 
greatness and sublimity. 

" No traces of the old hall, as it was called, are 
now remaining ; having fallen into an irreparable 
state of decay. It was taken down a few years 



48 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



since, by the late Sir Joshua Vanneck, baronet. I 
have so much of the antiquary in me, as to wish 
that some memorial of its simple grandeur could 
have been preserved. You will be delighted with 
Sir Joshua's noble plantation of oaks, beeches, and 
chestnuts, &c., with which he has ornamented the 
whole country, and which, in half a century, as the 
soil is favourable to them, will be an inexhaustible 
treasure to the public, as well as to his family." — 
Davy's Letters, vol. i. p. 240. 

More than half a century has elapsed since this 
account was written, but the Gothic turret with its 
irregular loop-holes is still remaining, although 
somewhat lower in altitude ; and Queen Elizabeth's 
Oak will probably witness the revolutions of more 
than another century, before its leafy honours are 
mingled with the dust. It measures thirty-four 
feet in girth, at five feet from the ground. Mr. Davy 
imagines it to have been five or six hundred years 
old at the time he saw it ; and its present appear- 
ance is sufficiently venerable to bear out the con- 
jecture. 

SIR PHILIP SIDNEY'S OAK. 

The beautiful estate of Penshurst, on which this 
tree stands, may be deemed classic ground in every 
part, as the ancient property of the Sidneys, one of 
the most illustrious families of which England can 



THE OAK. 



49 



boast. The tree itself has a more particular claiui 
on our veneration, having been planted at the birth of 
Sir Philip Sidney ; a name dear alike to valour and 
the muses, consecrated by every virtue that could 
adorn private life, and graced with talents that ren- 
dered their possessor the admiration of Europe, even 
in his bloom of youth. Every memorial of a birth 
so auspicious, every remembrance of a career so 
bright, though, alas ! 

" Brief as the lightning in the coUied night," 

is of value to the poet. Hence, this tree has been 
celebrated by many of our best writers. Ben 
Jonson speaks of it as, 

" That taller tree which of a nut was set 

At his great birth where all the Muses met." 

And Waller, the gallant and elegant Waller, who 
never lost sight of an allusion which might add, in 
the eyes of his mistress, to the vivacity of his attach- 
ment, thus immortalizes his numbers, by connecting 
them with a name which, whilst flngland exists as 
a nation, will always be proudly mentioned in her 
annals. 

" Go, boy, and carve this passion on the bark 
Of yonder tree, which stands the sacred mark 
Of noble Sidney's birth; when such benign. 
Such more than mortal-making stars did shine, 
That there they cannot but for ever prove 
The monument and pledge of humble love : 
His humble love whose hope shall ne'er rise higher 
Than for a pardon that lie dares admire." 

D 



50 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



Sweet sounds often awaken echoes not less sweet: 
so have these lines of Waller, rushing over a poetic 
mind, filled it with images of the Sidneys, the Dud- 
leys, the Leicesters of former ages ; and brought 
forth the following interesting picture of the feelings 
which Penshurst, so long the noble residence of 
busy and exalted spirits, is calculated to awaken 
in its present state of comparative desolation and 
abandonment. 

" Ye Towers sublime, deserted now and drear, 

Ye woods, deep sighing to the hollow blast. 
The musing wanderer loves to linger near. 

While History points to all your glories past ; 
And, startling from their haunts the timid deer. 

To trace the walks obscured by matted fern, 
Which Waller's soothing lyre were wont to hear. 

But where now clamours the discordant heron ! 
The spoiling hand of Time may overturn 

These lofty battlements, and quite deface 
The fading canvass, whence we love to learn 

Sidney's keen look, and Sacharissa's grace: 
But fame and beauty still defy decay. 
Saved by the historic page — the poet's tender lay ! " 

Charlotte Smith, 

OAKS IN YARDLEY CHASE. 

These fine trees, known by the characteristic ap- 
pellation of Gog and Magog, stand in Yardley Forest, 
and are the property of the Marquess of Northampton. 



THE OAK. 



51 



The largest of them, Gog, measures thirty-eight feet 
at the roots, twenty-eight feet at three feet from the 
ground ; is fifty-eight feet in height, and contains six- 
teen hundred and sixty-eight feet seven inches of 
solid timber. Magog is more imposing in dimensions, 
measuring fifty-four feet four inches at the ground, 
and thirty-one feet three inches at three feet higher 
up ; but in height it is inferior, being only forty-nine 
feet : its solid contents are nine hundred and twelve 
feet ten inches. The estate of the Marquess of 
Northampton abounds with many other magnificent 
specimens of forest trees ; and it will not lessen 
their interest to recollect, that among them the poet 
Cowper often pursued the train of moral thought, 
and wove the harmonious numbers, with which he 
afterwards delighted and improved the world ; and 
with what accuracy this observer of nature distin- 
guished the different species of the productions of 
the Forest, an accuracy not excelled by that of 
Spenser himself, may be seen in his description of 
the sylvan haunts he so much loved. 

" Nor less attractive is the woodland scene, 
Diversified with trees of every growth, 
Alike, yet various. Here the gray smooth trunks 
Of ash, or lime, or beech, distinctly shine. 
Within the twilight of their distant shades ; 
There, lost behind a rising ground, the wood 
Seems sunk, and shorten'd to its topmost boughs. 
No tree in all the grove but has its charms, 
Though each its hue peculiar ; paler some, 



52 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



And of a wannish gray; the willow such. 

And poplar, that with silver lines his leaf. 

And ash far-stretching his umbrageous arm ; 

Of deeper green the elm ; and deeper still. 

Lord of the woods, the long-surviving oak, 

Some glossy-leaved, and shining in the sun — 

The maple, and the beech, of oily nuts 

Prolific, and the lime at dewy eve 

Diffusing odours : nor unnoted pass 

The sycamore, capricious in attire. 

Now green, now tawny, and ere autumn yet 

Have changed the woods, in scarlet honours bright." 

THE OAKS AT FREDVILLE. 

Nearly in front of the family mansion of John 
Plumtre, Esq., in his park at Fredville, in the 
parish of Nonnington, Kent, is a group of oaks 
known by the names of Majesty, Stately, and 
Beauty. Seldom are three trees so different from 
each other in individual character, and so interest- 
ing altogether, to be found in such near proximity. 
Majesty, which, as its name denotes, is the largest, 
is somewhat more than twenty-eight feet in circum- 
ference, at eight feet from the ground, and contains 
above fourteen hundred feet of timber. Stately, 
the next in point of size, is a noble specimen of the 
tall oak ; the stem going up straight and clean to 
the height of seventy feet. The girth, at four feet 
from the ground, is eighteen feet; and it contains 



THE OAK. 



58 



about five hundred feet of timber. Beauty, at an 
equal height, is sixteen feet in circumference, and 
its solid contents are nearly the same. Altogether 
these three graces of the forest form a group imme- 
diately within sight of the house, which, for magni- 
ficence and beauty, is not perhaps to be equalled by 
any other of the same nature ; awakening in the mind 
of the spectator the most agreeable associations of the 
freedom and grandeur of woodland scenery, with 
the security and refinements of cultivated life. " Is 
it not a pity," says Sir Edward Harley, speaking of 
some ancient trees of his own, " that such goodly 
creatures should be devoted to Vulcan?" No such 
fate, however, attends this graceful trio ; and the 
pleasure with which the spectator views their diffe- 
rent characteristics, is heightened by a sense that 
they are likely to remain cherished and protected 
equally in their decay as in their prime. Protected 
from violence, they will probably stand many cen- 
turies ; and it may be hoped that they will as long 
continue to delight the descendants of the family by 
whom they are at present so highly valued, and so 
carefully preserved. 



54 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE OAKS AT BURLEY. 

This fine group of Oaks, twelve in number, of 
which a view is given in the title-page, stands on 
the lawn at Burley Lodge, New Forest, the property 
of Lord Bolton. The largest of them is seven yards 
and a half in circumference. They are known by 
the name of the Twelve Apostles, and perhaps this 
designation unconsciously adds to the feelings of 
reverence and regard which their venerable appear- 
ance, and their proximity to each other, as if drawn 
together by bonds of friendship, are calculated to 
inspire. There is a solemnity in a group of ancient 
trees that powerfully disposes the mind to serious 
thought, and carries it back to former ages : 

" It seems idolatry with some excuse 
When our forefatlier Druids in their oaks 
Imagined sanctity. The conscience, yet 
Unpurified by an authentic act 
Of amnesty, the meed of blood divine, 
Loved not the light, but, gloomy, into gloom 
Of thickest shades, like Adam after taste 
Of fruit proscribed, as to a refuge fled." 

COWPER. 

Chardin, who published his travels in Turkey in 
the 17th century, remarks, that the religious Maho- 
metans chose to pray under old trees, rather than in 
the neighbouring mosques : " They devoutly reve- 



THE OAK. 



55 



rence," says he, " those trees which seem to have 
existed during many ages ; piously believing that 
the holy men of former times had prayed and medi- 
tated under their umbrageous shade." With such 
feelings to enhance their favourite gratification of 
reclining under the widely-spreading branches of 
some fine tree, no wonder they regard the destruc- 
tion of one as an act of sacrilege. 

The beautiful forest scenery with which the Oaks 
at Burley are surrounded on every side, predispose 
the lover of sylvan objects to be pleased with them, 
at the same time that they awaken in his breast an 
ardent desire to see every tree that bows its head to 
the earth, either by natural decay, by the fury of 
the elements, or the more furious and unpitying axe, 
replaced by a whole group of successors. " The 
value of timber," says Gilpin, " is its misfortune : 
every graceless hand can fell a tree." But the hand 
that fells an oak can likewise plant an acorn ; and 
this restitution to mother earth is surely due from 
those who despoil her of her noblest and most 
ancient treasures, to satisfy some low necessity of 
the passing moment. Sir Robert Walpole planted 
with his own hands many of the magnificent trees 
which are now the pride of Houghton ; and of all the 
actions of his busy life, this is the one which seems 
to have given him most gratification in the perform- 
ance, and most pleasure in the retrospect. " Men," 
says Evelyn, " seldom plant trees till they begin to 



56 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



be wise ; that is, till they grow old, and find by 
experience the prudence and necessity of it." Ci- 
cero mentions planting as one of the most delightful 
occupations of old age, and it is indeed of all pur- 
suits connected with the interests of mankind, one 
of the most nobly disinterested, yet the most truly 
wise. He who puts a sapling into the ground, is 
morally certain that he shall not live to enjoy the 
shade of its matured branches ; but he enjoys it 
every day, and a thousand fold, in the thought, that 
the land, which to his predecessors had been only a 
barren waste, will present to his successors a scene 
of waving beauty, sheltering the surrounding country, 
and inviting many a devious step to explore its 
tangled haunts. This fine feeling of entering by 
proxy, as it were, into the interests and enjoyments 
of posterity, is most pleasingly expressed in the 
following lines, on an obelisk at the termination of a 
noble avenue in the park of Lord Carlisle, at Castle 
Howard in Yorkshire, and written by one of his 
ancestors : 

" If to perfection these plantations rise. 
If they agreeably my heirs surprise, 
This faithful pillar will their age declare, 
As long as Time these characters shall spare. 
Here then with kind remembrance read his name 
Who for posterity performed the same. 

Charles, the 3d Earl of Carlisle, 
of the family of the Howards. 
Erected 1731." 



THE OAK. 



57 



It is impossible to read these lines, quaint and 
simple as they are, without being conscious of senti- 
ments of respect towards the benevolent spirit by 
which they are dictated ; and under that impression 
the very trees themselves seem to rise in prouder 
majesty, to fan the air more gracefully, and to offer 
a more refreshing shade, in grateful tribute to the 
memory of him by whose hand they were planted. 



I 



58 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE ELM. 



Foecundje frondibus Ulmi. 

Virgil, 



In the scale of precedence among Forest trees the 
Ehn, which is indigenous to England, has a right, 
both with respect to beauty and utility, to claim a 
place next to the Oak in dignity and rank. One 
very important property, as regards the usefulness 
of its timber, is that of being able to bear the alter- 
nations of dryness and moisture, without rotting ; 
which renders it more especially fit for all purposes 
connected with water, or exposure to the atmo- 
sphere. The hardness of its grain is another quality 
that adds to its value ; nor ought its foliage to be 
forgotten ; forming, as it may do, a substitute for 
hay and fodder, in times of scarcity : the Roman 
husbandman, indeed, frequently fed his cattle on 
the leaves of the Elm ; hence Virgil reckons the 
redundancy of them among its excellencies. 



THE ELM. 



59 



No tree bears transplanting better than the Elm. 
It will suffer removal even at twenty years of age ; 
which renders it very desirable for those who may 
wish to impart to new-built mansions the respect- 
ability which leafy shades, of apparently long 
standing, always confer on a habitation. The Elm 
is, indeed, peculiarly fitted for "the length of 
colonnade," with which our forefathers loved to 
make graceful and gradual entry to their hospitable 
halls. Loving society, yet averse from a crowd, 
delighting in fresh air, and in room to expand its 
roots, and affording its aid to all the weaker plants 
in its vicinity that may seek its support, it presents 
a pleasing emblem of the class of country gentlemen, 
whose abodes it is oftenest found to adorn and pro- 
tect. Gilpin justly observes, that no tree is better 
adapted to receive grand masses of light than the 
Elm. In this respect it is superior, not only to the 
Oak and the Ash, but perhaps to every other tree ; 
nor is its foliage, shadowing as it is, of the heavy 
kind : its leaves are small, and this gives it a natural 
lightness ; it commonly hangs loosely and is in 
general very picturesque. It is likewise the first 
tree that salutes the early spring with its light and 
cheerful green, a tint which contrasts agreeably with 
the Oak, whose early leaf has generally more of the 
olive cast. They may be seen in fine harmony 
together in the beginning of May. 



60 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE CHIPSTEAD ELM 

stands on a rising ground, in a retired part of the 
pleasure-garden of George Polhill, Esquire, of Chip- 
stead Place, in Kent. It is sixty feet high ; twenty 
feet in circumference at the base ; and fifteen feet 
eight inches, at three feet and a half from the 
ground. It contains two hundred and sixty-eight 
feet of timber ; but this bulk is comparatively small 
to what it would have been, had it not sustained the 
loss of some large branches towards the centre. Its 
venerable trunk is richly mantled with ivy, and gives 
signs of considerable age ; but the luxuriance of its 
foliage attest its vigour, and it is as fine a specimen 
of its species in full beauty as can be found. 

It may not be amiss to remark in this place, that 
the Elm is peculiarly liable to injury from the 
attacks of insects of the beetle kind ; one of which 
in particular, the hylesinus destructor, of Fabricius, or 
scolytus destructor, of Latreille, is peculiar to it, and 
is its most formidable enemy. Much valuable in- 
formation is given on this subject by Mr. Maclery, 
in his " Report to the Treasury, on the State of the 
Elms in St. James's Park, in 1824," which may be 
found in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal for 
July, in that year. After several excellent remarks 
on the ravages committed by certain insects on forest 
trees, in which he points out with great sagacity 



THE ELM. 



Gl 



the causes of those diseases among them that appear 
to be infectious, and often blight at once the planta- 
tions and the hopes of the planter : " Of the evil 
which is mentioned above in general terms," he 
proceeds to observe, " St. James's and Hyde Parks 
afford us at present too many examples. The elm- 
trees in both, and particularly in St. James's Park, 
are rapidly disappearing ; and unless decisive mea- 
sures be soon taken to resist the progress of the 
contagion, we must not only expect every tree of 
this species to be destroyed in the Parks, but may 
have to regret the dissemination of the evil through- 
out the vicinity of London. In the year 1780, an 
insect of the same natural family as the Jiyles'mus 
destructor, made its appearance in the pine-forests 
of the Hartz, and was neglected. In the year 1783, 
whole forests had disappeared, and, for want of fuel, 
an end was nearly put to the mining operations of 
that extensive range of country. At the present 
moment, also, the French Government is in alarm 
at the devastation committed in their arsenals, by 
an insect well known to naturalists, under the name 
of lymexylon navale. About ten years ago, the 
principal naval engineer at Toulon, M. de Cerisier, 
who happened to be conversant with entomology, 
discovered this insect in the dock-yards, and recom- 
mended certain precautions to be taken for the 
preservation of the timber there lodged. The French 
Government objected to the expense requisite for 



62 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



obviating an evil, of which, as yet, they had no 
experience ; and now, when perhaps it is too late, the 
minister of marine has determined to follow M. de 
Cerisier's advice. It is from such instances that we 
perceive the truth of an observation made by a 
French academician, while alluding to the devasta- 
tion which such insects may occasion : " L'histoire 
de ces animaux m6rite d'etre connue, k raison de 
son extreme importance, de tous les grands pro- 
pri^taires, et surtout par les inspecteurs generaux de 
nos forets ; elles ont aussi leurs insectes destructeurs ; 
et ils verroient combien de causes, qui dans le prin- 
cipe ne fixent au moment I'attention, peuvent par 
negligence devenir funestes a I'Etat." 

THE CRAWLEY ELM 

stands in the village of Crawley, on the high road 
from London to Brighton. It is a well-known object 
to all who are in the habit of travelling that way, 
and arrests the eye of the stranger at once by 
its tall and straight stem, which ascends to the 
height of seventy feet, and by the fantastic rugged- 
ness of its wildly-spreading roots. Its trunk is per- 
forated to the very top, measuring sixty-one feet in 
circumference at the ground, and thirty-five feet 
round the inside, at two feet from the base. 

In former ages it would have constituted a fit 



THE ELM. 



63 



retreat for a Druid, whence he might have dispensed 
his sacred oracles ; or in later times for a hermit, 
who might have sat within the hollow stem with 
" His few books, or his beads, or maple dish," 

and gazed on the stars as they passed over his head, 
without his reflections being disturbed by the inter- 
vention of a single outward object : but to the bene- 
volent mind it gives rise to more pleasing ideas in its 
present state : lifting its tranquil head over humble 
roofs, which it has sheltered from their foundation, 
and affording, in the projections and points around 
its base, an inexhaustible source of pleasure to the 
- train of village children who cluster like bees around 
it ; trying their infant strength and courage in climb- 
ing its mimic precipices, whilst their parents recall, 
in their pastimes, the feelings of their own child- 
hood ; when, like them, they disported under the 
same boughs. It is such associations as these that 
render a well-known and favourite tree an object 
that no art can imitate ; no substitute replace. It 
seems to live with us, and for us ; and he who can 
wantonly destroy the source of so much innocent, 
and indeed exalted gratification, appears to commit 
an injury against a friend, which we find more diffi- 
culty in forgiving than one against ourselves. It 
would be impossible to see such a noble tree as the 
Crawley Elm felled without regret ; — its aged head 
brought prostrate to the ground, its still green 
branches despoiled in the dust, its spreading roots 



1 



G4 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



left bare and desolate. The old would miss it, as 
the object that brought back to them the recol- 
lections of their youth ; the young would lament for 
it, as having hoped to talk of it when they should be 
old themselves. The traveller who had heard of its 
beauty would look for it in vain, to beguile him on 
the road ; and the weary wanderer, returning to his 
long-left home, would scarcely know his paternal 
roof, when robbed of the shade of the branches 
which he had seen wave even before his cradle. A 
stately forest is one of the grandest sights in creation ; 
an insulated tree one of the most beautiful. In the 
deep recesses of a wood an aged tree commands a 
veneration, similar to that which we are early taught 
to feel towards the possessor of royalty, or the 
minister of religion ; but in a hamlet, or on a green, 
we regard it with the gentler reverence due to a 
parent, or the affection inspired by the presence of a 
long-tried friend. 

THE ELMS AT MONGEWELL. 

These noble trees are close to the residence of the 
late Bishop of Durham, at Mongewell in Oxford- 
shire, celebrated by Leland for its " faire woodes," 
and may serve to recall to the mind of the beholder 
Cowper's eulogium on shades so natural and de- 
lightful. 



THE ELM. 



65 



"Our fathers knew the value of a screen 
From sultry suns, and in their shaded walks 
And long-protracted bowers enjoyed, at noon, 
The gloom and coolness of declining day." 

The principal tree among them is seventy-nine 
feet in height, fourteen in circumference, at three 
feet from the ground, sixty-five in extent of boughs, 
and contains two hundred and fifty-six feet of solid 
timber. About the centre of the group stands an 
urn vi^ith the following inscription : 

To the Memory 
Of my 

Two Highly Valued Friends, 
Thomas Tyrwhitt, Esq. 
And 

The Rev. CM. Cracherode, M.A. 

In this once favour'd walk, beneath these Elms, 

Whose thicken'd foliage, to the solar ray 

Impervious, sheds a venerable gloom. 

Oft in instructive converse we beguiled 

The fervid time which each returning year 

To friendship's call devoted. Such things were ; 

But are, alas ! no more. 

S. DUNELM. 

Pleasing as it always is to see worth and genius 
paying tribute to kindred associations, it is particu- 
larly so in the present instance, from the illustrious 
Prelate who, in these lines, hands down the names 
of his friends to posterity, and whom it was de- 
lightful to contemplate wandering, in his ninetieth 

E 



66 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



year, amidst shades with which he was almost 
coeval, and which in freshness and tranquilHty 
afforded the most soothing emblems of his own 
green and venerable old age. 

THE TUTBURY WYCH-ELM. 

The Wych-Elm, or Wych Hazel, as it is some- 
times called, from the resemblance that its leaves 
and young shoots bear to those of the Hazel, is a 
species of the Elm, which is valuable rather for the 
quantity of its timber than the quality of it. Since 
the long bow, for the making of which it was much 
esteemed in former times, has fallen entirely into 
disuse, its value is proportionably lessened. It is, 
however, a noble spreading tree, and grows oc- 
casionally to a prodigious size, as may be seen 
by Evelyn's account of one in Sir Walter Bagot's 
park, in the county of Stafford, " which," says he, 
" after two men had been five days felling, lay 
forty yards in length, and was, at the stool, seven- 
teen feet diameter. It broke in the fall four- 
teen load of wood, forty-eight in the top ; yielded 
eight pair of panes, eight thousand six hundred and 
sixty feet of boards and planks ; the whole es- 
teemed ninety-seven tons. This was certainly a 
goodly stick." The Tutbury Wych-Elm is thus 
mentioned by Shaw, in his history of Stafford- 



THE ELM. 



67 



shire: — "In the road leading from Tutbury to 
Rolleston is a very large and beautiful Wych-EIm, 
the bole of which is remarkably straight, thick, 
and lofty; having eight noble branches, the size 
of common trees, v^hich spread their umbrageous 
foliage luxuriantly around, forming a magnificent 
and graceful feature, both in the near and distant 
prospect. This, if not at present, wiW, in a few- 
years, be as great a curiosity in the vegetable world, 
as the famous Wych-Elm at Field, described by 
Doctor Plott." 

" The trunk of this tree is twelve feet long, and 
sixteen feet nine inches in circumference, at the 
height of five feet from the ground ; seven feet higher, 
the trunk divides into the " eight noble branches ; " 
they are nearly fifty feet high, and extend between 
forty and fifty feet from the centre of the tree, 
which contains six hundred and eighty-nine cubic 
feet of timber. The interest that this beautiful 
object imparts to the spot on which it stands, is 
increased by the pleasing prospect of Tutbury Castle, 
which lifts its venerable remains in the distance, and 
awakens a train of interesting reflections, on the vir- 
tues of one of its earliest owners, "Time-honored 
Lancaster," and the vicissitudes to which it has been 
exposed, during the ages that have now left it only 
the vestige of what it was, in the days of feudal 
greatness. 



68 SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE WYCH ELM AT BAGOT'S MILL 



is more distinguished by its beauty than its size. 
It is in such situations as the present, abounding 
in rural objects, each connected with another in har- 
mony and fitness, that an insulated tree inspires re- 
flections peculiarly pleasing. It seems the common 
property of all who raise their humble tenements 
within sight of its branches, and is one of the de- 
lightful ornaments of nature that the poorest cottager 
may enjoy and be proud of, as he sees the stranger 
stop to gaze at it. Perhaps there is no country in the 
world where an admiration of fine trees is so genuinely 
felt, or so generally diffused, through all ranks, as in 
England. " I am fond of listening," says a Trans- 
atlantic writer, long esteemed, and now domesticated 
among us, " to the conversation of English gentle- 
men on rural concerns ; and of noticing with what 
taste and discrimination, and with what strong un- 
affected interest, they will discuss topics which, in 
other countries, are abandoned to mere woodmen or 
rustic cultivators. I have heard a noble earl descant 
on park and forest scenery with the science and 
feeling of a painter : he dwelt on the shape and 
beauty of particular trees on his estate, with as much 
pride and technical precision as though he had been 



THE ELM. 



69 



discussing the merits of statues in his collection. I 
found that he had even gone considerable distances 
to examine trees which were celebrated among rural 
amateurs ; for it seems that trees, like horses, have 
their established points of excellence ; and that 
there are some in England which enjoy very exten- 
sive celebrity among tree-fanciers, from being per- 
fect in their kind. There is something nobly simple 
and pure in such a taste : it argues, I think, a sweet 
and generous nature to have this strong relish for the 
beauties of vegetation, and this friendship for the 
hardy and glorious sons of the forest. There is a 
grandeur of thought connected with this part of 
rural economy. It is, if I may be allowed the 
figure, the heroic line of husbandry. It is worthy 
of liberal, and free-born and aspiring men. He who 
plants an oak looks forward to future ages, and plants 
for posterity. Nothing can be less selfish than this. 
He cannot expect to sit in its shade, nor enjoy its 
shelter ; but he exults in the idea, that the acorn 
which he has buried in the earth shall grow up into 
a lofty pile, and shall keep on flourishing and in- 
creasing, and benefiting mankind, long after he 
shall have ceased to tread his paternal fields. In- 
deed it is the nature of such occupations to lift the 
thoughts above mere worldliness. As the leaves of 
trees are said to absorb all noxious qualities of the 
air, and to breathe forth a purer atmosphere, so it 
seems to me as if they drew from us all sordid and 



70 



S Y LVA B RITA N N 1 C A . 



angry passions, and breathed forth peace and phi- 
lanthropy. There is a serene and settled majesty in 
woodland scenery that enters into the soul, and di- 
lates and elevates it, and fills it with noble incli- 
nations. The ancient and hereditary groves, too, 
that embower this island, are most of them full of 
story. They are haunted by the recollections of 
great spirits of past ages, who have sought for re- 
laxation among them from the tumult of arms, or the 
toils of states, or have wooed the muse beneath their 
shade. Who can walk, with soul unmoved, among 
the stately groves of Penhurst, where the gallant, 
the amiable, the elegant, Sir Philip Sidney passed 
his boyhood? or can look without fondness upon 
the tree that is said to have been planted on his 
birth-dav ? or can ramble among the classic bowers 
of Hagley ? or can pause among the solitudes of 
Windsor Forest, and look at the oaks around, huge, 
gray, and time-worn, like the old castle-towers, and 
not feel as if he were surrounded by so many monu- 
ments of long- enduring glory ? It is when viewed 
in this light, that planted groves, and stately ave- 
nues, and cultivated parks, have an advantage over 
the more luxuriant beauties of unassisted nature. 
It is that they teem with moral associations, and 
keep up the ever- interesting story of human exist- 
ence. It is incumbent, then, on the high and gene- 
rous spirits of an ancient nation, to cherish these 
sacred groves that surround their ancestral mansions, 



THE ELM. 



71 



and to perpetuate them to their descendants. Re- 
publican as I am by birth, and brought up as I have 
been in republican principles and habits, I can feel 
nothing of the servile reverence for titled rank, 
merely because it is titled ; but I trust that I am 
neither churl nor bigot in my creed, I can both see 
and feel how hereditary distinction, when it falls to 
the lot of a generous mind, may elevate that mind 
into true nobility. It is one of the effects of here- 
ditary rank, when it falls thus happily, that it multi- 
plies the duties, and, as it were, extends the exist- 
ence of the possessor. He does not feel himself a 
mere individual link in creation, responsible only for 
his own brief term of being. He carries back his 
existence in proud recollection, and he extends it 
forward in honorable anticipation. He lives with 
his ancestry and he lives with his posterity. To 
both does he consider himself involved in deep 
responsibilities. As he has received much from 
those that have gone before, so he feels bound to 
transmit much to those who are to come after him. 
His domestic undertakings seem to imply a longer 
existence than those of ordinary men ; none are so 
apt to build and plant for future centuries, as noble- 
spirited men who have received their heritages from 
foregone ages." — Washington Irving. 



72 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE BEECH. 



Sylva domus, cubilia frondes. 

The wood a house, the leaves a bed. 

Juvenal. 



There is no tree with which more classical and 
pleasing associations are connected, than the Beech ; 
the very mention of it recalls Virgil's 

" Tityre, tu, patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi, 
Silvestrem tenui Musam ineditaris avena :" 

and a thousand images of rural life, of rustic lovers 
carving their mistresses' names on its silver bark, of 
tuneful shepherds disputing for bowls of its wood, 
as curiously carved, and almost as much valued as if 
of precious metal, all spring into the imagination. 

The Beech, however, has more solid claims on 
admiration than those which merely affect the fancy. 
It is a profitable as well as a beautiful tree ; for 
though its wood, on account of being exceedingly 
subject to the ravages of the worm, is not so fit as the 



THE BEECH. 



73 



Elm or Walnut for purposes where durability is re- 
quisite, it is yet much used for household furniture, 
and instruments of husbandry, and, when kept under 
water, is little inferior in ship-building to the Elm 
itself. The Beech will grow in the most stony and 
barren soils ; and as a shelter in exposed situations 
it is particularly desirable, on account of retaining 
its glittering leaves till the very end of autumn, and 
indeed many of them throughout the winter ; their 
delicate green gradually changing to modest brown, 
then to glowing orange, and latest to the more ap- 
propriate red. In the spring its foliage, feathering 
almost to the ground, is exquisitely beautiful ; and 
its fantastic roots, immortalised by Gray, in his 
celebrated Elegy, are frequently covered with wild 
flowers. " About the end of September, when the 
leaf begins to change, it forms a happy contrast 
with the Oak whose foliage is yet verdant, and we 
shall find the finest opposition of tint which the 
forest can furnish, arise from the union of the oak 
and the beech." Swine, deer, and the smaller qua- 
drupeds, tenants of the hollow trees, such as the 
squirrel, mouse, and dormouse, greedily fatten upon 
its mast, which is likewise capable of being con- 
verted into bread and oil for the human race ; its 
leaves afford the most agreeable matrasses, conti- 
nuing sweet and tender for seven or eight years 
together, and are eulogised by Evelyn, from his own 
experience, for their refreshing softness. It must. 



74 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



however, be acknowledged, that its shades are more 
favourable to the traveller and the shepherd, than 
to vegetation ; and that it is of that encroaching 
and dominant nature, that a wood which may have 
been originally in equal proportions of Oak and 
Beech, will in course of time become entirely 
beechen. 

THE GREAT BEECH IN WINDSOR 

FOREST, 

near Sawyer's Gate, in the neighbourhood of Sun- 
ning Hill, presents remains of surpassing grandeur, 
and evidently of great antiquity. " Its rugged 
projections and twisted roots give it, on one side, 
the appearance of some rude mass of broken archi- 
tecture ; whilst on the other it is entirely hollow, 
and surrounded by lofty and aged trees, spread- 
ing their dark umbrageous arms, as if to hide 
the access to it : insomuch that one coming sud- 
denly upon the sequestered spot in remoter times, 
might have imagined that he had ventured unawares 
within the precincts of some marauder's cave ; or 
intruded, perchance, on some holy anchorite's 
retreat. Many, indeed, are the delightful scenes 
of contemplation that this magnificent and truly 
regal forest affords. Many are the aged oaks and 
spreading befeches, that seem to speak of the days 



I 




THE BEECH. 75 

of Arthur with his knights ; of William the Norman ; 
of the third Edward ; of his peerless son, the Black 
Prince ; of his illustrious captive, John of France ; 
and of characters blazoned in the page of later his- 
tories, that have rested beneath their shade. Nor 
can these noble forest scenes fail to be still more 
pleasing to those who recreate themselves among 
them in the present day, from the consideration that 
they give added beauty and variety to an abode fitly 
chosen for the favoured residence of royalty ; and to 
which, the elegant description by Camden will be 
found to apply as aptly at the present moment, as 
when it was first written : 

" From a high hill," says he, which riseth with 
a gentle ascent, it overlooketh a vale lying out far 
and wide, garnished with corn fields, flourishing 
with meadows, decked with groves on either side, 
and watered with the most mild and calm river 
Thames. Behind it arise hills every where, neither 
rough nor over-high ; attired with woods ; and even 
dedicated, as it were, by nature, to hunting and 
game." — Delici^ Sylvarum, p. 2. 

To this beautiful assemblage of natural images, set 
forth in the truth of prose, not even the poetical 
numbers of Pope can give additional attraction. 

" Here waving groves a chequer'd scene display. 
And part admit, and part exclude the day : 
There interspersed in lawns and opening glades 
Thin trees arise that shun each other's shades. 



THE BEECH. 



77 



And as they bow their hoary tops relate, 

In murm'ring sounds, the dark decrees of Fate ; 

While visions, as poetic eyes avow, 

Cling to each leaf, and swarm on every bough." 

" At the foot of one of these squats me I, {il Penserosd) 
and there grow to the trunk for a whole morning. 
The timorous hare and sportive squirrel gambol 
around me like Adam in Paradise, before he had an 
Eve ; but I think he did not use to read Virgil, as I 
commonly do there." It is easy to recognise in this 
description the same feelings and observations after- 
wards depicted in the portrait of " A youth to fortune 
and to fame unknown," of whom the writer says, in 
his celebrated Elegy, 

" There at the foot of yonder nodding beech. 
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high. 
His listless length at noon-tide would he stretch, 
And pore upon the brook that bubbles by." 

Here indeed the beech, so celebrated by poets, 
reigns in undivided sovereignty, scarcely admitting 
an oak to share its domain, so that we may easily 
imagine how it must have overrun the country before 
the opposing influence of agriculture was known ; 
indeed we are told by old historians, the county 
was rendered impassable by the thickness of its 
woods, and the shelter they afforded for marauders 
and thieves, until several of them were cut down by 
Leofstan, Abbot of St. Alban's. — Delici^ Syl- 
VARUM, page 7. 



78 



SYLVA BRITANNTCA. 



THE ASH. 



Fraxinus in Sylvis pulcherrinia. 

Virgil. 

The Ash, from the lightness of its foliage, the 
graceful sweep of its branches, and the silvery ap- 
pearance of its stem, has been called the Venus of 
the Forest ; nor is it less admirable for utility than 
for beauty, as there is no timber, excepting that of 
the Oak, that is more generally in use. It is ex- 
tremely profitable to the planter, as it will grow 
well in almost any soil, but its shade is accounted 
unfavourable to vegetation, and as it casts its leaves 
early, and displays them late, it is less desirable for 
avenues and pleasure-grounds ; though when it is in 
fine foliage, there is no tree more beautiful. 

THE GREAT ASH AT WOBURN 

stands in the Park of His Grace the Duke of Bed- 
ford, about a quarter of a mile from the mansion, 
and is an extraordinary specimen of the size which 




t 



THE ASH. 



79 



this tree will attain in favourable situations. It is 
ninety feet high, from the ground to the top of its 
branches ; and the stem alone is twenty-eight feet. 
It is twenty-three feet six inches in circumference 
on the ground, twenty at one foot, and fifteen feet 
three inches at three feet from the ground. The 
circumference of its branches is one hundred and 
thirteen feet in diameter ; and the measurable tim- 
ber in the body of the tree, is three hundred and 
forty-three feet ; and in the arms and branches, 
one of which is nine feet in circumference, five 
hundred and twenty-nine ; making altogether eight 
hundred and seventy- two feet of timber. It is 
in mountain scenery that the ash appears to pe- 
culiar advantage ; waving its slender branches over 
some precipice which just affords it soil sufficient 
for its footing, or springing between crevices of 
rock, a happy emblem of the hardy spirit which 
will not be subdued by fortune's scantiness. It is 
likewise a lovely object by the side of some crystal 
stream, in which it views its elegant pendent foliage, 
bending. Narcissus-like, over its own charms. The 
Ash was held in great veneration by the ancients : 
insomuch that Hesiod, the oldest of poets, derives 
his brazen men from it ; and the Edda assigns the 
same origin to all the human race. Nor is there 
any tree to which poetry or superstition has at- 
tached more legendary incidents, or more miraculous 
powers. 



80 



SYLVA CRTTANNICA. 



THE CHESNUT. 



The Cliesnut is indigenous to England, and will 
thrive in almost any soil and any situation. In 
variety of usefulness its timber equals, and in some 
respects excels that of the Oak. Its luxuriance of 
foliage and feathered stems, render it conspicuous 
among all other trees for beauty; and its fruit 
might, by proper management, be made a valuable 
article of food in this country, as it is in France 
and Italy, where it is subjected to a variety of culi- 
nary processes, that convert it into delicacies for the 
tables of the luxurious, and into nutritious bread for 
the humbler classes. 

The Chesnut sometimes grows to a prodigious 
size. Evelyn speaks of one in Gloucestershire, 
which contained " within the bowels of it, a pretty 
wainscoted room, enlightened with windows, and 
furnished with seats, &c.; but the largest known 
in the world is upon Mount Etna, in Sicily. This 



THE CHESNUT. 



81 



tree, which goes by the name of Castagno de Cento 
Cavalli, is described by Brydone, who went to see 
it through five or six miles of ahiiost impassable 
forests, growing out of the lava, as having the ap- 
pearance of five large trees growing together ; but 
upon a more accurate examination, strengthened by 
the assurances of scientific persons, he became in- 
clined to believe that they had been formerly united 
in one solid stem, and on measuring the hollow space 
within, he found it two hundred and four feet round : 
Carrera's assertion, that there was wood enough in 
that one tree to build a large palace, can therefore 
scarcely be regarded as an exaggeration. 

The chesnut flourishes abundantly amidst the 
mountains of Calabria ; hence it is that we find it 
always forming a prominent feature in the bold and 
rugged landscapes of Salvator Rosa, who drew several 
of his most striking scenes from the wild haunts and 
natural fastnesses of that romantic country, wherein 
he passed so many of his youthful days. The ches- 
nut appears to have been more plentiful in former 
times in this country than it is at present. Many 
of the most ancient houses in London were built of 
its wood, as is the roof of Westminster Hall, built 
by William Rufus in the year 1099, still free from 
any appearance of decay, and one of the finest pro- 
ductions, in its kind, of human art, in point of size, 
beauty, strength, and durability. Of late years, 
however, the attention of planters has been turned 

F 



82 



SYLVA BRIT7VNNICA. 



more to the cultivation of the chesnut; and as it is 
highly ornamental whilst growing, is early capable 
of being converted into excellent timber, and quarrels 
which no soil assigned to it, it is on every account 
deserving of encouragement. 

THE TORTWORTH CHESNUT 

is probably the oldest tree now standing in England. 
It is brought forward in evidence by Dr. Ducarel, in 
his contest with Daines Barrington, respecting the 
Chesnut being a native of Britain, as a proof that 
it is indigenous. In the reign of Stephen, who 
ascended the throne in 1135, it was deemed so re- 
markable for its size, that, as appears upon record, 
it was well known as a signal boundary to the 
manor of Tortworth, in Gloucestershire, where it 
stands, and is mentioned as such by Evelyn, in his 
Sylva, b. III. c. 3. At the time that it was thus 
conspicuous for its magnitude and vigour, we may 
reasonably suppose it to have been in its prime : if 
therefore, we pay any regard to the received opinion 
which is applied to the Chesnut, equally with the 
Oak, that it is three hundred years in coming to 
perfection, this calculation takes us back to the 
beginning of the reign of Egbert, in the year 800, 
for the commencement of the existence of the Tort- 
worth Chesnut. Since that epoch above a thou- 



THE CHESNUT. 



83 



sand years have rolled over its yet green head. 
How is it possible, bearing this reflexion in our 
minds, to look upon its gigantic trunk, and w^idely- 
spreading arms, without feelings of reverence ! How 
many, not merely generations of men, but whole 
nations, have been swept from the face of the earth, 
whilst, winter after winter, it has defied the howling- 
blasts with its bare branches, and spring after spring 
put forth its leaves again, a grateful shelter from the 
summer suns ! Its tranquil existence, unlike that 
of the human race, stained by no guilt, chequered 
by no vicissitudes, is thus perpetually renewing 
-itself; and, if we judge from the luxuriance of its 
foliage, and the vigour of the branches which en- 
circle the parent stem in wild profusion, may be 
prolonged for as many more centuries as it has 
already stood. Nor is it solitary in its old age. Its 
progeny rises around it, and its venerable roots are 
nearly hidden by the lighter saplings and bushes 
that have sought the protection of its boughs, making- 
it appear a grove in itself — a fit residence for some 
sylvan deity, and realising Cowley's animated 
apostrophe : 

" Hail, old patrician trees, so great and good ! 

Hail, ye plebeian underwood, 

Where the poetic birds rejoice. 
And for their quiet nests and plenteous food 

Pay with their grateful voice. 



84 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



" Here Nature does a house for me erect, — - 

Nature, the wisest architect. 

Who those fond artists does despise 
That can the fair and living trees neglect, 

Yet the dead timber prize. 

" Here let me, careless and unthoughtful lying, 
Hear the soft winds above me flying. 
With all their wanton boughs dispute, 

And the more tuneful birds to both replying. 
Nor be myself too mute." 

It is only on approaching within the very limits 
overshadowed by its spreading branches, that the 
size of this majestic tree can be duly estimated ; but 
when its full proportions are fairly viewed on all 
sides, it strikes the beholder with feelings of wonder 
and admiration, alike for its bulk and for the num- 
ber of centuries which it has been in attaining it. 

When we consider how beautiful and interesting 
an object a magnificent tree is in itself, how proud 
an ornament it forms to the spot whereon it flou- 
rishes — an ornament not to be equalled by any 
edifice reared by human hands ; how incontestable 
a witness it bears to the ancient riches or honours 
of those on whose estates it may for ages have been 
cherished and preserved ; it might be imagined, that 
such as are fortunate enough to possess any remark- 
able treasures of this description in their parks or 
forests, would at least be as studious to retain them, 
as to amass other curiosities of nature or of art. 



THE CHESNUT. 



85 



which may be of comparatively short duration: yet 
the Tortworth Chesnut does not appear to have 
been treated with the respect due to its age and 
magnitude, or the care desirable for its continuance. 
It is only within a few years that it has been re- 
lieved from the pressure of three walls, in the angle 
of which it stood, and which must have greatly 
injured the spreading of its roots. The axe which 
might have been commendably employed in clearing 
the approach to it of brambles and briers, has, on 
the contrary, been barbarously, though not recently, 
applied to the tree itself ; which has been wantonly 
despoiled of several large limbs on the north-east 
side, apparently many years ago ; it is in conse- 
quence much decayed on that side, whilst on the 
others it is still sound. The Tortworth Chesnut, in 
1766, measured fifty feet in circumference, at five 
feet from the ground. Its present measurement, at 
the same height, is fifty-two feet. The body is ten 
feet in height, to the fork, where it divides into three 
limbs, one of which, at the period already mentioned, 
measured twenty-eight feet and a half in girth, at the 
distance of five feet from the parent stem. The 
solid contents, according to the customary method 
of measuring timber, is one thousand nine hundred 
and sixty-five feet ; but its true geometrical contents 
must be much more. Young trees are now nursing 
from the nuts which it bore three years ago ; and it 



86' 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



is to be hoped that their pedigree will be preserved, 
as none can boast more ancient ancestry. 

ft/ 

THE HORSE CHESNUT AT BURLEIGH. 

The Horse Chesnut, we are informed by Evelyn, 
was first brought from Constantinople to Vienna; 
thence into Italy, and so to France ; but more 
immediately to us from the Levant. It is probable 
that its introduction into England took place about 
the year 1500 ; and so well has it liked its naturali- 
zation, that it at present forms one of the chief 
ornaments of our groves and parks. To the painter 
the magnificence of its stature, and the beauty of its 
broad palmated leaves, and long pendent spikes of 
flowers scarcely atone for the exceeding regularity 
of its form, terminating, as it invariably does, when 
left to the hand of nature, in an exact parabola. 
Yet in the following description of it we can scarcely 
wish for any thing to be altered : " On reaching 
the village green, we cannot choose but pause before 
this stately Chesnut Tree, the smooth stem of which 
rises from the earth like a dark-coloured marble 
column, seemingly placed there by art to support 
the pyramidal fabric of beauty that surmounts it. 
It has just put forth its first series of rich fan-like 
leaves, each family of which is crowned by its 



THE CHESNUT. 



87 



splendid spiral flower ; the whole at this period of 
the year forming the grandest vegetable object that 
our kingdom presents, and vying in rich beauty with 
any that Eastern woods can boast. And if we 
could reach one of those flowers to pluck it, we, 
should find that the most delicate fair ones of the 
garden or the green-house do not surpass it in elabo- 
rate penciling and richly- varied tints. It can be 
likened to nothing but its own portrait painted on 
velvet." — Mirror of the Months, p. G9. 

In the extraordinary specimen of this tree, which 
is to be seen in the Court-yard of Burleigh House, 
the ancient and highly-interesting seat of the Mar- 
quess of Exeter, all its beauties will be found exhi- 
bited in their utmost perfection, without the draw- 
back of a single disadvantage. From being enclosed 
in a space comparatively confined, the formality of 
its summit is exchanged for increased length of 
stem ; the tree having shot up unusually high, most 
likely in the endeavour to lift its head above the 
surrounding walls, which at once shelter it from 
injury, and impede that free play of the elements in 
which the "native burghers of the forest" naturally 
delight. Its branches, feathering. down to the velvet 
turf on which it stands, exhibit a delightful alter- 
nation of milk-white flowers and russet fruits ; whilst 
the stately trunk displays an elegance and majesty, 
which, combined with the venerable turrets that rise 
around, filling the mind with recollections of the 



88 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



Cecils and the Burleighs of former ages, render it an 
object not to be looked ujjon without exciting feel- 
ings in which tranquillity and admiration are most 
pleasingly united. 

The height of this fine tree is sixty feet, its cir- 
cumference at four feet from the ground is ten feet ; 
it contains three hundred feet of solid timber, and 
its branches extend over an area of sixty-one feet in 
diameter. 



ANCIENT CHESNUT AT COBHAM. 

This tree, called the Four Sisters, from its four 
branching stems closely combined in one massive 
trunk, stands in the Heronry, in the finely wooded 
Park at Cobham Hall, the ancient seat of the 
illustrious family of that name, so well known 
in English History, and now the property of John 
fourth Earl of Darnley. It is the noble remains 
of a most magnificent tree ; and though its head 
has paid forfeit to the " skiey influences" during a 
long succession of revolving seasons, yet it is not 
left entirely stripped of ornament in its old age ; as 
a number of tender shoots spring out of its topmost 
branches, and still give it, by the lightness of their 
foliage, an appearance of freshness, of which its aged 
trunk would almost forbid the expectation. It is 
thirty-five feet two inches in circumference at the 



THE CHESNUT. 



89 



ground, avoiding the spurs ; twenty-nine feet, at 
three feet from the ground ; thirty-three feet at 
twelve feet from the ground, and forty feet at the 
point where the trunk divides. On looking at a tree 
of this magnitude and antiquity, it is natural that 
we should desire to know its exact age ; but this is 
a point always of difficult and uncertain determina- 
tion, unless some historical fact should give it chro- 
nological precision. The common mode of judging 
by the number of solar revolutions, or circles occa- 
sioned by the bark of the preceding season being 
digested and compacted into a ligneous substance, 
and afterwards invested with a succeeding coat, 
which is the next year to be converted in the same 
manner into the substantial wood, is liable to inac- 
curacy, on account of the earlier portion of the rings 
becoming absorbed and indistinct by age ; nor is the 
scale of comparison, with other trees of the same 
species, more satisfactory ; for, as it has been re- 
marked, the lives and stature of trees, like those of 
animals, must vary with the situations in which they 
are placed, and the accidents to which they may be 
exposed. In general, the trees which in the end 
obtain the greatest size, are the slowest in growth ; 
it may therefore reasonably be inferred that the 
age of our largest trees is often far beyond that as- 
signed to them by obscure tradition or vague con- 
jecture ; and it is not improbable that the " Four 
Sisters" may have attained their tenth century. 



90 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE FALLEN CHESNUT. 

In Cobham Park, not far from the Four Sisters, 
is one of those accidents of nature so pleasing to a 
painter to meet with in his rambles, and so well 
calculated to tempt the poetical imagination to mo- 
ralise the spectacle " into a thousand similes." 
" Delighting thus in trees," says an elegant writer, 
who has withheld his name from the respect his 
genius would secure to it, " I must more than others 
grieve for their loss, and a storm awakens in me 
almost the fears of those whose friends are mariners. 
I dread to see the shivered tops and the scattered 
boughs. The great tree torn up by its roots, lying- 
in gigantic length, along the ground it yesterday 
shaded, rending the green-sward into an unsightly 
broken mound, showing the strong hold in the earth 
which it had firmly grappled, now broken and for 
ever destroyed — is to me a sight the most mournful : 
it seems to me almost the overthrow of a living being 
of power and might, so long had it stood erect and 
nobly immoveable in the war of elements. The 
pride of its foliage, the majesty of its leafy head, 
now low in the dust, are indeed piteous to beheld. 
The storms it has so often braved, at last prevail, 
and by one dread gust it falls before the breath of 
heaven." With equal feeling, and still more strength. 



THE GHESNUT. 



91 



does Evelyn describe the effects of the lawless winds 
which, on the 26th November, 1 703, levelled at once 
two thousand noble denizens of his beloved woods to 
the earth, almost within sight of his own dwelling. 
" In the mean while," says he, " as the fall of a very 
aged oak, giving a crack like thunder, has been often 
heard at many miles distance, constrained though I 
often am to fell them with reluctance, I do not at any 
time remember to have heard the groans of those 
nymphs, grieving to be dispossessed of their ancient 
habitations, without some emotion and pity. Me- 
thinks that I still hear, sure I am that I still feel, the 
dismal groans of our forests ; that late dreadful hurri- 
cane having subverted so many thousands of goodly 
oaks, prostrating the trees, laying them in ghastly 
postures, like whole regiments, fallen in battle by 
the sword of the conqueror, and crushing all that 
grow beneath them." There is one reflection that 
the sight of a tree thus laid low by Him whose 
" wind bloweth where it listeth," must suggest to 
the religious mind, that whether it "fall toward the 
south or toward the north, in the place where the 
tree falleth, there shall it lie ; " and if we bring this 
reflection properly home to ourselves, and to our own 
eternal state, as fixed on the same irrevocable prin- 
ciple, we may indeed congratulate ourselves on 
finding 

" tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 

Sermons in stones, and good in everything." 



92 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE LIME TREE. 



" The Lime, at dewy eve, 
Diffusing odours." 



The Lime Tree, or Linden, is said to have been 
introduced into England from Germany in the reign 
of Elizabeth, by Sir John Spelman, to whom we 
are also indebted for the introduction of the manu- 
factory of paper. Tt is not, however, so much cul- 
tivated in this as in many other countries, particu- 
larly in Germany and Switzerland, where there are 
some of the largest in the world ; and in Holland, 
where they not only shelter and adorn the highways, 
but are planted in many towns in even lines before 
the houses, throughout the streets, filling the air 
with the fragrance of their blossoms, and screening 
the passengers from the sun, with the luxuriance of 
their shade. It is peculiarly adapted for avenues, 
from the straightness of its stem, and the luxuriant 
spreading of its branches, which are likewise so 
tough as to withstand the fury of gales that would 



THE LIME TREE. 



93 



dismember most other trees. The red-twigged Lime 
is preferable for this purpose in point of beauty, on 
account of the pleasing- spectacle which the red 
twigs afford in the absence of its leaves. 

The Lime Tree can accommodate itself to almost 
any kind of ground ; but in a rich loamy soil it 
grows with almost incredible swiftness, and spreads 
to an amazing size. Evelyn thus describes some of 
the giants of this species : " But here does properly 
intervene the Linden of Schalouse in Swisse, under 
which is a bower composed of its branches, capable 
of containing three hundred persons sitting at ease : 
it has a fountain set about with many tables, formed 
only of the boughs, to which they ascend by steps, 
all kept so accurately, and so very thick that the 
sun never looks into it. But this is nothing to that 
prodigious Tilia of Neustadt, in the Duchy of Wir- 
temberg, so famous for its monstrosity, that even 
the city itself receives a denomination from it, being- 
called by the Germans Neustadt ander grossen Linden, 
or Neustadt by the great Lime Tree. The circum- 
ference of the trunk is twenty-seven feet four fingers ; 
the ambitus, or extent of the boughs, four hundred 
and three fert ; the diameter from south to north 
one hundred and forty-five, from east to west one 
hundred and nineteen feet ; set about with divers 
columns and monuments of stone, (eighty-two in 
number at present, and formerly above a hundred 
more,) which several Princes and Noble Persons 



94 



SYLVA BRITANNTCA. 



have adorned, and celebrated with inscriptions, arms 
and devices ; and which, as so many pillars, serve 
likewise to support the umbrageous and venerable 
boughs; and that even the tree had been much 
ampler, the ruins and distances of the columns de- 
clare, which the rude soldiers have greatly im- 
paired." — Discourse on Forest Trees, p. 493. 
edit. 1776. 

Leaving, however, these monstrosities," as 
Evelyn styles them, we may turn with perhaps 
more real interest to the beautiful specimen of 

THE LIME TREE IN MOOR PARK, 

Hertfordshire, the family seat of Robert Williams, 
Esq. ; a place venerable for its antiquity, and fa- 
miliar to the lovers of gardening, by Sir William 
Temple's eulogium on it, as affording in his time the 
most perfect combination of garden elegance and 
utility in England. This tree, standing upon a little 
eminence, finely terminates a row of stately Limes 
which bound one side of the Park, for more than 
three quarters of a mile ; all of which are more 
lofty, and some of larger girth than this ; but none 
equalling it in luxuriance of shade, and redundancy 
of branches, nineteen of which, almost rivalling the 
parent stem, have, at about nine feet from the 
ground, struck out in horizontal lines to the length 
of from sixty-seven to seventy-one feet ; and from 



THE LIME TREE. 



95 



six to eight feet in circumference ; bearing again in 
their turn three or four upright limbs, like so many- 
young trees, and reminding the beholder of pros- 
perous colonies, at once supported by, and adding to 
the importance of their mother country. It must 
have been some such object that suggested to the 
fervid imagination of Milton his beautiful description 
of the fig-tree. 

" ■ Such as at this day (to Indians known, 

In Malabar or Deccan,) spreads her arms 
Branching so broad and long, that in the ground 
The bended twigs take root, and daughters grow ' 
About the mother-tree, a pillar'd shade 
High over-arch'd, and echoing walks between : 
There oft the Indian herdsman, shunning heat, 
Shelters in cool and tends his past'ring herds 
At loop-holes cut through thickest shade." 

Paradise Lost, B. 9, 1200. 

The age of the Moor Park Lime-tree is not exactly 
known ; but it is at this present period in the most 
vigorous state of luxurious growth, and has every 
promise of attaining a much larger size. Its circum- 
ference on the ground is twenty-three feet three 
inches ; at three above, it is seventeen feet six 
inches ; its branches extend one hundred and 
twenty-two feet in diameter, and cover three hun- 
dred and sixty feet in circumference. It is nearly 
a hundred feet in height, and contains, by actual 
measurement, eight hundred and seventy-five feet 
of saleable timber. 



96 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



THE POPLAR. 



Populus in fluviis. 

ViRGTL. 



The Poplar may be classed among the aquatic 
trees, though it will grow exceedingly well on 
ground comparatively dry. There are many species 
of the Poplar, the chief of which are the white, the 
black, and the trembling, or aspen. Of these, the 
Black Poplar is the most scarce in England ; it is 
oftener to be found in Cheshire and Suffolk, than in 
any other counties. 

THE BLACK POPLAR AT BURY 
ST. EDMUNDS 

may probably challenge competition, both in size 
and beauty, with any other individual of its kind in 
the kingdom. It stands near the old monastic bridge, 
which, with the little river Lark, that runs beneath 
it, reflecting the graceful branches of the Poplar in 



THE POPLAR. 



97 



its waters, forms an interesting picture, well calcu- 
lated to attract the attention of the traveller, as he 
enters the town, by the road from Norwich. 

The height of this tree is ninety feet, and its cir- 
cumference, at a yard from the ground, fifteen ; the 
trunk rises forty-five feet, with but little diminution 
in. size, when it divides into a profusion of luxuriant 
branches : its solid contents are five hundred and 
fifty-one feet. 

The Poplar may be regarded in every respect as 
a classical tree. It was held Sacred to Hercules by 
the ancients ; and is celebrated by Homer, Virgil, 
and Ovid. The latter speaks of the transformation 
of the sisters of Phaeton into Poplars ; and the fic- 
tion seems to wear almost the appearance of reality, 
from the number of those trees that still flourish on 
the banks of the Po in Italy, in the vicinity of the 
ancient Eridanus, into which the ambitious cha- 
rioteer is said to have been precipitated by Jupiter. 
The Poplar, like other trees of the aquatic tribe, 
copiously exudes the moisture which it imbibes ; 
insomuch that, in hot calm weather, its foliage, 
like that of the Willow, is additionally grate- 
ful from the drops of water that hang upon its 
leaves, with the refreshing coolness of a summer 
shower ; and which, to a poetical imagination, like 
that of Ovid, affords a lively picture of the tears of 
Phaeton's sisters for his loss, completing the beauty 
of the story which relates their metamorphosis. 

G 



100 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE ABBOT'S WILLOW 

is of the species termed by botanists Salix Alba, 
and is probably for size and age unequalled in the 
kingdom. It stands in the grounds of John Ben- 
jafield, Esq. at Bury St. Edmund's, on a part of the 
ancient demesne of the Abbot of Bury, and which 
was in the actual possession of the Monastery, at the 
time of its dissolution. 

The author of that most pleasing work intitled 
*' The Journal of a Naturalist," observes that "the 
Willow is so universally subjected to pollarding, 
that probably few persons have ever seen a willow 
tree. At any rate, a sight of one grown unmuti- 
lated from the root is a rare occurrence. The few 
that I have seen constituted trees of great beauty." 
One, in particular, in the meadows on the right of 
the Spa House at Gloucester, he remarks, is so 
healthy and finely grown that it deserves every 
attention, and should be preserved as a unique 
specimen ; an example of what magnitude this 
despised race may attain when suffered to proceed 
in its own unrestrained vigour." — p. 398. 

From the uncommon size of this tree, and its being 
called " The Abbot," conjecture may lead us to sup- 
pose that it was planted previously to the dispersion 



THE WILLOW. 



101 



of the members of the far-famed and splendid 
monastery, which took place in the reign of Henry 
VIII. Of this, however, there is no certain proof ; 
but its vast dimensions plainly indicate it to have 
been the growth of centuries. Notwithstanding 
the great space its spreading branches occupy, it 
has hitherto suflfered but little, either from wind or 
time, nor does it at present exhibit any symptoms 
of decay. The soil around is certainly of a nature 
genial to this class of aquatic trees ; for which, as 
Evelyn observes, a bank at a foot distance from the 
water, is kinder than a bog, or to be altogether im- 
. mersed in the water ; "for they love not to wet their 
feet," and last the longer for being kept mode- 
rately dry : nevertheless, the Abbot's Willow may 
owe some of its freshness and vigour to a part of its 
roots communicating with the bed of a small adjoin- 
ing river, the Lark, on whose bank it stands, in the 
vicinity of the Botanic Garden : an establishment 
to which the town and neighbourhood of Bury St. 
Edmund's are indebted for some of the most elegant 
and instructive of their recreations, through the 
exertions of Nathaniel Hodson, Esq., its proprietor; 
a gentleman whose diligent research in botanical 
science, and general taste in all branches of natural 
history, are already well known to the public. 

The measurements of this tree, as taken by Mr. 
Lenny, an able and accurate Surveyor at Bury, are 
as follows : Its height is seventy-five feet : the cir- 



102 



SYLVA BRITANNTCA. 



cumference of the stem eighteen feet six inches. 
The two principal limbs are fifteen and twelve feet 
in circumference ; the ambitus of the boughs is two 
hundred and four feet ; and it contains four hundred 
and forty feet of solid timber. 

"The Weeping Willow," says Gilpin, "is a very 
picturesque tree. It is not, however, adapted to sub- 
lime subjects. We wish it not to skreen the broken 
buttresses and gothic windows of an abbey, nor 
to overshadow the battlements of a ruined castle. 
These offices it resigns to the oak, whose dignity can 
support them. The weeping willow seeks a hum- 
bler scene, some romantic footpath bridge, which it 
half conceals, or some glassy pool, over which it 
hangs its streaming foliage, 

and dips 

Its pendent boughs, stooping as if to drink. 

In these situations it appears in character, and of 
course to advantage. Some willows, indeed, I have 
thought beautiful, and fit to appear in the decoration 
of any rural scene. The kind I have most admired 
has a small narrow leaf, and wears a pleasant light 
sea-green tint, which mixes agreeably with foliage 
of a deeper hue. I believe the botanists call it 
the Salix Alba."- — 'Remarks on Forest Scenery, 
Vol. I. p. 67. 



THE CEDAR. 



103 



THE CEDAR. 



The Cedar proud and tall, 

Spenser. 



The Cedar of Lebanon has been generally sup- 
posed to be a native of Mount Libanus only ; but 
modern travellers have found it on Mount Taurus 
and other elevated situations in the Levant, and it is 
so hardy, that it can easily adapt itself to any 
climate. It has not been much cultivated in Eng- 
land till of late years ; although its quick growth, 
and its capability of thriving in a meagre soil, ren- 
ders it peculiarly desirable for those bleak and 
barren situations which have hitherto been princi- 
pally devoted to the Fir. 

The frequent and solemn allusions to the Cedar 
of Holy Writ, seem to give it something of a sacred 
character ; which is increased by a knowledge of 
the esteem in which it was held by the ancients, on 
account of its fragrant scent, its incorruptible nature, 
and above all, its durability, insomuch that it is re- 



104 SYLVA BRITANNICA. 

corded, that in the temple of Apollo at Utica, there 
was found timber of Cedar nearly two thousand 
years old. 

It entered largely into the construction of the 
most celebrated buildings of antiquity ; and in the 
glorious temple of Solomon it seems to have been 
recorded of it, as one of its proudest boasts, that 
"all was cedar; there was no stone seen." 

THE ENFIELD CEDAR 

stands in the garden of the Manor House, or old 
Palace in Enfield, the occasional retirement of 
Queen Elizabeth before she came to the throne, and 
the frequent scene of her royal pleasures afterwards, 
in the early part of her reign. In the year 1660 it 
became the residence of the learned Doctor Uvedale, 
Master of the Grammar School of Enfield at that 
time, and famous for his curious gardens and choice 
collection of exotics. The Cedar, which is now per- 
haps the largest in the kingdom, was put into the 
ground by him, a plant brought direct from Mount 
Libanus. In 1779 it measured fourteen feet six inches 
at the base, and forty-five feet nine inches in height, 
eight feet of the upper part having been broken off 
by a high wind in 1703. The principal branches 
extended in length from the stem, from twenty-eight 
to forty-five feet, and the contents of the tree, ex- 



THE GEDAR. 



105 



elusive of the boughs, was about two hundred and 
ninety-three cubic feet. In the night of the fifth of 
November, 1794, it again suffered by a high wind, 
which, blowing furiously from the north-west, de- 
prived it of the principal top-branch, which fell 
with a tremendous crash, and injured several of the 
branches below in its fall. In 1821, Dr. May, its 
present proprietor, and the able Master of the Gram- 
mar School at Enfield, took its measurement, which 
was as follows : seventeen feet in circumference at 
one foot from the ground, sixty-four feet in perpen- 
dicular height, and containing five hundred and 
forty-eight cubic feet of timber, exclusive of the 
branches, which from north-east to south-west 
extend eighty-seven feet, and contain about two 
hundred and fifty feet of timber, making in the 
whole nearly eight hundred cubic feet of timber. 

Some years ago, this great ornament to Enfield 
was destined to be cut down by a gentleman who 
had purchased the spot on which it stood ; but the 
contemplation of its loss excited so much regret and 
discontent among several of the most respectable 
inhabitants in the place, that he was obliged to re- 
linquish the barbal-ous design, even after the trench 
was dug around it, the saw-pit prepared, and the 
axe almost lifted up for its destruction. An account 
of the whole proceeding, as well as a very minute 
one of the tree itself, is to be found in Mr. Robin- 
son's valuable and interesting History of Enfield. 



106 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE GREAT CEDAR AT HAMMERSMITH. 

This magnificent tree has every way a claim to 
the title of Great, being at this time one of the 
largest, the stateliest, and the most flourishing in 
the kingdom. Its stem, at the ground, is sixteen 
feet six inches in circumference, its height is fifty- 
nine feet, and its branches cover an area of eighty 
feet in diameter. When it is in the full prime of its 
summer foliage, M^aving its rich green arms to the 
gentle breezes, and hiding the small birds innume- 
rable in its boughs, it affords a fine exemplification 
of the sublime description of the Prophet Ezekiel, in 
his comparison of the glory of Assyria, in her "most 
high and palmy state :" 

" Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair 
branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature, 
and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him 
great, the deep set him up on high, with her rivers running round 
about his plants, and sent out her little rivers unto all the trees 
of the field. 

" Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the 
field, and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became 
long because of the multitude of waters, when he shot forth. 

" All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and 
under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their 
young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations. 

" Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches : 




I 



THE CEDAR. 



107 



for his root was by great waters. The cedars in the garden of 
God could not hide him : the fir-trees were not like his boughs, 
and the chesnut-trees were not like his branches ; nor any tree in 
the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty. 

" I have made him fair by the multitude of his branches : so 
that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied 
him."— c. 31. 

A fertile imagination might be led to suppose that 
this noble tree had witnessed its princes, its heroes, 
and its statesmen, holding their councils, and form- 
ing their lofty projects under the shadow of its 
branches. The house, with which it may probably 
be coeval, and which appears to belong to the 
Elizabethan order of architecture, was in later times 
the residence of Oliver Cromwell, during the period 
of the Protectorate ; and some who, dazzled by the 
glare of false greatness, confound striking incidents 
with grand ones, have been anxious to inspire ad- 
ditional respect for the venerable walls, by assigning 
to them the unenviable distinction of having had 
the death-warrant of Charles the First signed within 
them. Very different, at this time, are the pursuits 
carried on, the consultations held in its once stately 
council chamber. The house has been, the last half 
century, devoted to the purposes of education : fair 
and youthful forms supply the places of sour-visaged 
Puritans, and lank-haired Roundheads ; mandates 
and treaties are turned into exercises and themes ; 
and though the Cedar may still be made occasionally 



108 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



the confidant of whispered plans of future greatness, 
or visionary happiness, it is to be hoped it will never 
again listen to the schemes of guilty ambition, or the 
sighs of fruitless remorse. 



THE CEDARS IN THE APOTHECARIES' 
GARDEN CHELSEA. 



These trees were planted, according to Dr. 
Hunter, in his notes to Evelyn's Sylva, in 1683. 
In 1774 they had attained a circumference of twelve 
feet and a half, at two feet from the ground, while 
their branches extended over a circular space forty 
feet in diameter. Seven-and-twenty years after- 
wards the trunk of the largest one had increased 
more than half a foot in circumference : this shows 
the quickness of its growth in proportion to that of 
the Oak, which, in the same period, would probably 
not have made half that progress. Dr. Hunter 
speaks of the branches hanging down nearly to the 
ground, and affording thereby "a goodly shade in 
the hottest season of the year." At present, how- 
ever, these pendent branches are so far " curtailed 
of their fair proportions" that they would afford no 
more shade than might be desired when the sun is 
just entering the vernal solstice; and indeed they 
have of late years altogether drooped and languished. 



THE CEDAR. 



109 



owing, it has been conjectured, to the filling-up of a 
neighbouring pond by which they were supposed to 
be formerly nourished : but this is scarcely probable, 
as the cedar naturally assimilates with a poor soil ; 
and it is more likely that the real cause of the injury 
done to these fine trees, as well as to all the other 
productions of the spot on which they stand, a spot 
rendered almost classical ground by the name of its 
founder. Sir Hans Sloane, may be found in the 
pestiferous vapour of the numerous gas-works by 
which it is surrounded. 

There is something in the air of the Cedar re- 
markably indicative of its comparatively immortal 
nature. The foliage is very beautiful : each branch 
is perfect in its form ; the points of the leaves spread 
upwards into little tufts, feathering the whole upper 
surface of the branch, and drooping in graceful curves 
towards the extremity, whilst the colour exhibits a 
rich green, harmonizing between the blue tint of the 
pine and fir, and the lurid and gloomy one of the 
cypress. Its peculiarity in raising its boughs to sup- 
port the load that may oppress them, is prettily 
alluded to by the late talented Mrs. Franklin : 

" meek in power, 

Her gentle spirit rose in danger's hour. 
The cedar thus, when halcyon summer shines. 
Graceful to earth its pendent boughs declines ; 
But when on Libanus the snows descend, 
To meet the weight its rising branches bend," 



110 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE PLANE TREE. 



Virentis umbra sub platan i. 

Claudian. 



The Plane Tree is of comparatively modern intro- 
duction into this country, which is said to be in- 
debted for it to the great Lord Chancellor Bacon, 
who probably procured the firstlings of the species 
from Sicily, into which Island it was transplanted 
from the Levant, and afterwards spread throughout 
Italy, of which it has ever since formed the coolest 
and most refreshing shades. It was held in the 
highest estimation by the ancient Greeks and 
Romans. We are told of Xerxes, that finding one 
of extraordinary beauty and dimensions, he halted 
his army to pitch his tent under its shade, bedecked 
it with a golden chain in token of his admiration, 
when he was compelled to proceed ; and afterwards 
caused a golden medal to be struck, engraved with 
the image of the tree, and which he wore ever after, 
in remembrance of the pleasure he had felt in reposing 



THE PLANE. 



Ill 



beneath its balmy and luxuriant foliage. Among 
the numerous acts of eccentricity attributed to 
Xerxes, this is perhaps the only one which can be 
dwelt upon with any view of placing his character 
in an advantageous light, as it at least shows him to 
have possessed a mind originally alive to the beau- 
ties of nature, and retaining, in the midst of all 
his luxury and excesses, sensibility enough to be 
affected by them. 

Homer mentions a sacrifice under a beautiful 
Plane tree, noixf^ wtto 7r'KaTavl(TTa>. The philosophical 
conversations of Socrates are represented as passing 
under its shade ; and the academic groves, at the 
very mention of which Plato and his disciples rise to 
the enamoured fancy, were formed of its branches. 
The Romans thought their most magnificent villas 
imperfect unless they were sheltered by the lofty 
and wide-spreading plane ; and the Turks, who 
treat it with extraordinary reverence, plant it near 
their dwellings, under the idea that it sheds a salu- 
tary influence over the noxious vapours by which 
the plague is generated. No part of Europe can 
show such gigantic Planes as those in the neigh- 
bourhood of Constantinople. They may be esteemed 
next to the Cedars of Lebanon in dignity and dura- 
bility. The precise age that the Plane tree will 
attain, has never been exactly ascertained ; but if 
we accept the testimony of Pausanias, who lived in 
the middle of the second century, we shall scarcely 



112 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



assign it a shorter period of duration than the Oak ; 
for he tells us of one in Arcadia of extraordinary- 
size and beauty, supposed to have been planted by 
Menelaus, the husband of the beautiful Helen, 
about thirteen hundred years before the period when 
he describes it as being in so much luxuriance and 
vigour. There are two species of this tree, the 
Oriental and the Occidental : they both love the 
water, particularly the Occidental, which thrives 
rapidly by the side of a stream ; and the size which 
they attain in those soils where they flourish best, 
introduces them to a still closer acquaintance with 
the element they are so fond of, by rendering their 
trunks fit for vessels and canoes, to which purpose 
they are frequently applied. 

THE PLANE TREE AT LEE COURT, 

near Blackheath, is a beautiful specimen of the 
Oriental kind. It waves its slender branches and 
light clustering leaves over the stream of a small 
rivulet, tempting the angler to seek its cooling 
shade ; whilst within a few yards' distance, on 
the opposite bank, stands the ancient residence 
of the family of Bohun, thus described in the 
journal of Evelyn. " Went to visit our good 
neighbour Mr. Bohun, whose whole house is a 
cabinet of all elegancies, especially Indian : in the 



THE PLANE. 



113 



hall are contrivances of Japan skreens instead of 
wainscot, and there is an excellent pendule clock, 
enclosed in the curious flower-work of Mr. Gibbons, 
in the middle of the vestibule. The landscapes of the 
skreens represent the manner of living, and country 
of the Chinese. But above all, his lady's cabinet is 
adorned, on the fret, ceiling, and chimney piece, 
with Mr. Gibbons' best carving. There are also some 
of Streeter's best paintings, and many curiosities of 
gold and silver, as growing in the mines. The gardens 
are exactly kept, and the whole place very agree- 
able and well watered." The tree itself is mentioned 
in a subsequent passage. " Sept. 16, 1683. — At the 
elegant villa and garden of Mr. Bohun's at Lee. He 
shewed me the Zinnar tree, or Platanus, and told 
me that since they had planted this kind of tree 
about the city of Ispahan in Persia, the plague, 
which formerly much infested the place, had ex- 
ceedingly abated of its mortal effects, and rendered 
it very healthy." — Evelyn's Alemoirs, Vol. i. p. 525. 
Lee Court remains at present much in the state in 
which it was during Evelyn's time ; and the idea 
of this Plane tree having been examined by him 
with curiosity and interest, as one of the first intro- 
duced into this country, is sufficient to give it value 
in the eyes of all who are acquainted with his 
admirable genius and virtues, independent of the 
attraction which it may boast in its own beauty. — 

H 



114 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



The circumference of this tree at six feet from the 
ground is fourteen feet eight inches ; it rises to the 
height of about sixty-five feet, and contains three 
hundred and one feet of timber. 

It would be well if we could revive so much of 
the veneration of the ancients for the Plane, as 
might induce us, like them, to plant it round our 
Schools and new Universities : our tiros in philo- 
sophy might, by the powerful influence of association 
of ideas, inhale under its branches some of the lofty 
contemplations of their predecessors, practise them- 
selves in the same habits of simplicity, and finally 
arrive at the same height of intellectual and moral 
excellence. Delightful indeed is it, as Horace says, 

" Atque inter Sylvas Academi quaerere verum." 

Neither the studies of the young, nor the peaceful 
retreats of the aged, should ever be without those 
breathing temples, those 

" Long living galleries of aged trees," 

favourable alike to learning and to religion. 

*' In such green palaces the first kings reign 'd, 
Slept in their shades, and angels entertain'd 
With such old counsellors they did advise, 
And by frequenting sacred groves grew wise. 
Free from th' impediments of light and noise, 
Man, thus retired, his nobler thoughts employs. 



THE YEW. 



115 



THE YEW. 



" The warlike yew, by which more than the lance, 
The strong-arm'd English spirits conquer'd France." 

Drayton. 



The Yew was formerly much esteemed in Eng- 
land, when the cross-bow was in use. Spenser 
praises it as 

"The Eugh obedient to the bender's will ;" 

and that it had merited the reputation for many 
centuries is evident from Virgil's mention of it for 
the same purpose : 

" Ityraeos Taxi torquentur in arcus." 

But as the use of fire-arms has superseded that of 
the bow, and as the improvements in modern taste 
have equally exploded the formal hedges and fan- 
tastical figures, for which the Yew was highly prized 
by the gardeners in Queen Elizabeth's time, it is no 
longer cultivated as it was in former ages ; when it 
was enjoined to be planted in all church-yards and 



116 



SYLVA BRTTANNICA. 



cemeteries : partly to insure its cultivation ; partly 
to secure its leaves and seeds from doing injury to 
cattle ; and partly because its unchanging foliage 
and durable nature made it a fit emblem of immor- 
tality ; whilst, at the same time, its dark green ren- 
dered it not less aptly illustrative of the solemnity of 
the grave. 

The Yew-tree lives to a great age : indeed it can 
scarcely ever be said to die, new shoots perpetually 
springing out from the old and withered stock. 



THE YEW TREE AT ANKERWYKE, 

near Staines, the seat of John Blagrove, Esq., is 
supposed to have flourished there upwards of a 
thousand years. Tradition says, that Henry VIII. 
occasionally met Anne Boleyn under the lugubrious 
shade of its spreading branches, at such times as 
she was placed in the neighbourhood of Staines, in 
order to be near Windsor ; whither the king used to 
love to retire from the cares of state. Ill-omened as 
was the place of meeting under such circumstances, 
it afforded but too appropriate an emblem of the 
result of that arbitrary and ungovernable passion, 
which, overlooking every obstacle in its progress, 
was destined finally to hurry its victim to an un- 
timely grave. It is more pleasing to view this tree 
as the silent witness of the conferences of those 




\ 



THE YEW. 



117 



brave barons who afterwards compelled King John 
to sign Magna Charta, in its immediate vicinity, 
between Runnymede and Ankerwyke House, than 
as the involuntary confidant of loves so unhallowed 
and so unblest as those of Henry and Anne Boleyn. 
Both events, however, are happily alluded to in the 
following lines : 

*• What scenes have pass'd, since first this ancient Yew 
In all the strength of youthful beauty grew ! 
Here patriot Barons might have musing stood. 
And plann'd the Charter for their Country's good ; 
And here, perhaps, from Runnymede retired, 
The haughty John, with secret vengeance fired. 
Might curse the day which saw his weakness yield 
Extorted rights in yonder tented field. 
Here too the tyrant Henry felt love's flame. 
And, sighing, breathed his Anna Boleyn's name : 
Beneath the shelter of this Yew-tree's shade. 
The royal lover woo'd the ill-starr'd maid : 
And yet that neck, round which he fondly hung. 
To hear the thrilling accents of her tongue ; 
That lovely breast, on which his head reclined, 
Form'd to have humanized his savage mind ; 
Were doom'd to bleed beneath the tyrant's steel, 
Whose selfish heart might doat, but could not feel. 
O had the Yew its direst venom shed 
Upon the cruel Henry's guilty head, 
Ere England's sons with shuddering grief had seen 
A slaughter 'd victim in their beauteous queen !" 

The girth of this tree, at three feet from the ground, 
is twenty-seven feet eight inches; at eight feet. 



118 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



thirty-two feet five inches. Immediately above the 
latter height there are five principal branches, which 
shoot out from a stem in a lateral direction ; the 
girth of which are, five feet five inches ; six feet ten 
inches ; five feet seven inches ; five feet seven inches ; 
and five feet nine inches. Above these branches, 
the trunk measures in the girth twenty feet eight 
inches. At twelve feet from the ground various 
branches proceed in every direction, aspiring to the 
height of forty-nine feet six inches ; and spreading 
their umbrage to the circumference of two hundred 
and seven feet. 

THE YEW TREES AT FOUNTAINS' 

ABBEY. 

These venerable Yew Trees stand on a small emi- 
nence at Studley Royal, near R,ipon, overlooking 
the ruins at Fountains' Abbey, which celebrated 
monastery was founded about the end of the year 
1132, by Thurston, Archbishop of York, for certain 
Monks, whose consciences being too tender to allow 
them to indulge in the relaxed habits of their own 
order, made them desirous of following the more 
rigorous rule of the Cistercians, founded by the cele- 
brated Saint Bernard, and then lately introduced 
into England. Of the origin of Fountains' Abbey, 
as the date of these Yew Trees is particularly con- 



THE YEW. 



119 



nected with it, the following account from Burton 
may not be deemed unacceptable : 

" At Christmas, the Archbishop, being at Ripon, 
assigned to the Monks some land in the patrimony 
of St. Peter, about three miles west of that place, 
for the erecting of a monastery. The spot of ground 
had never been inhabited, unless by wild beasts, 
being overgrown with wood and brambles, lying 
between two steep hills and rocks, covered with 
wood on all sides, more proper for a retreat for wild 
beasts than the human species. This was called 
Skeldale, that is, the vale of Skell, a rivulet running 
through it from the west to the eastward part of it. 
The Archbishop also gave to them a neighbouring 
village called Sutton- Richard. The prior of St. 
Mary's at York was chosen Abbot by the Monks, 
being the first of this Monastery of Fountains ; with 
whom they withdrew into this uncouth desert, with- 
out any house to shelter them in that winter season, 
or provisions to subsist on, but entirely depending 
on divine Providence. There stood a large Elm in 
the midst of the vale, on which they put some thatch 
or straw, and under that they lay, eat, and prayed ; 
the bishop for a time supplying them with bread,, 
and the rivulet with drink. Part of the day some 
spent in making wattles to erect a little oratory, 
whilst others cleared some ground to make a little 
garden. But it is supposed they soon changed the 
shelter of their Elm for that of seven Yew Trees 



120 



SYLVA BRTTANNTCA. 



growing on the declivity of the hill on the south side 
of the Abbey, all standing at this present time, ex- 
cept the largest, which was blown down about the 
middle of the last century. They are of an extra- 
ordinary size ; the trunk of one of them is twenty- 
six feet six inches in circumference, at the height of 
three feet from the ground, and they stand so near 
each other as to form a cover almost equal to a 
thatched roof. Under these trees, we are told by 
tradition, the Monks resided till they built the Mo- 
nastery ; which seems to be very probable, if we 
consider how little a Yew Tree increases in a year, 
and to what a bulk these are grown. And as the 
hill side was covered with wood, which is now al- 
most all cut down, except these trees, it seems as if 
they were left standing to perpetuate the memory of 
the Monks' habitation there during the first winter 
of their residence." 

There is something extremely captivating to the 
imagination in the thought that these venerable trees 
have witnessed the first rearing of the noble edifice, 
on whose ruins they seem to look in sympathetic 
decay. They may be imagined as addressing them — 

" O our coevals, remnants of yourselves ! " 

indeed, every thing connected with them is calcu- 
lated to awaken the fancy of the poet and the painter, 
and the reflections of the moralist. 

In going from Pately Bridge towards Ripon, about 



THE YEW. 121 

three miles from the latter place, there is a road 
across the fields, which leads the pedestrian through 
a sequestered burial-ground belonging to a small 
chapel, into a retired and beautifully wooded lane ; 
at the bottom of which he is brought into full view, 
all at once, of Fountains' Abbey : which by this 
simple route strikes much more powerfully on the 
feelings, than when gradually approached by the 
more formal walks through the pleasure-grounds of 
Studley. From the moment of beholding these mag- 
nificent ruins, the spectator must be rapt in delight ; 
now tracing the remains of the Abbey, its nave, its 
transept, its cloisters, now turning to enjoy the 
sweetly solemn effect of the general scene. The 
Ash and Birch enliven by their foliage the dark 
masses of shade thrown out by groups of Fir, Larch, 
and Oak : the cliff's that rise around appear like na- 
tural walls, afi'ording a delightful variety of tint, and 
shaded by ancient trees, whilst the tender saplings 
spring from between the crevices. Part of the clois- 
ters stretches over the Skell, which murmurs respon- 
sive to the scene ; the arches cast a deep and dark 
reflection on the water ; whilst about the ruins wave 
lofty trees, tipped with light foliage, which is also 
seen peeping in at the narrow pointed windows, as 
they reflect the light from each other. Opposite to 
this secluded spot is a small recess in the rocks, by 
speaking from which a clear echo is returned in a few 



122 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



seconds, as if it floated along the ruined choirs and 
vaulted passages of the roofless Abbey. Inexpressi- 
bly interesting are these aerial sounds to the ima- 
ginative ear ! It should seem as if the spirits of the 
cowled brethren still loved to linger in the haunts so 
dear to them whilst they were in a state of mortal 
existence — still loved to keep up a link of association 
with those who, themselves " warm in life," may 
have been treading just before on the ashes, which, 
at the sound of human footsteps, again glowed with 
their wonted fires. It did indeed seem the voice of 
past ages, 

" Vox et praeterea nihil :" 

but how eloquent the response which calls up the 
scenes and actors of so long a train of centuries gone 
by! It is such thoughts as these that invest the 
venerable Yew Trees, the silent witnesses of the 
changes of time, and the decays of nature, with so 
much interest, and renders their preservation so de- 
sirable. They do not, however, appear to be treated 
with the reverence due to them : a low wall hides 
their weather-beaten boles on the side whence they 
would otherwise be seen to the most advantage, and 
a paltry little stable is erected almost beneath their 
branches ; on which, worst injury of all, the marks 
of the despoiling axe are but too visible, and the 
ground underneath is strewed with fragments of 



THE YEW. 



123 



larger limbs, probably torn away for petty purposes, 
to which meaner wood might have been applied with 
equal utility. 

It is unfortunate for the Yew tree that " the days 
of chivalry are past." A pure native of Britain, it 
was formerly that basis of its strength which the oak 
is now. It was the boast of the old English yeoman, 
that his long-bow, made from its branches, could be 
bent by none but an English arm ; and we find it 
mentioned by all cur older poets with the respect 
due to its being associated in their mind with ideas 
of knightly valour, 

" Of sallies and retires ; of trenches, tents, 
Of palisadoes, fortins, parapets ; 
Of basilisks, of cannon, culverin, 
Of prisoners' ransom, and of soldiers slain." 

But now its " occupation's gone !" the "cannon" 
and the " culverin" have superseded the arrow's 
fateful flight, and the Yew, no longer called for in 
the field of battle, takes peaceful refuge in the 
library, or the boudoir, under some of the orna- 
mental forms for which it is peculiarly fitted by its 
susceptibility of polish, and the variegated beauties 
of its surface. 



124 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



THE MAPLE. 



Acerque coloribus impar. 

The maple, stain'd with various hues." 

Ovid. 



The small or common Maple is very inferior in 
size to the Sycamore, or greater Maple ; but the 
timber is much more valuable ; and is held in the 
highest estimation by turners and cabinet-makers, 
on account of the exquisite beauty of veining which 
it frequently presents. The wood of the Maple is 
also much prized for musical instruments, on account 
of its lightness ; and the tree itself yields a sap which 
upon evaporation will leave sugar as perfect in qua- 
lity as that of the cane, though inferior in point of 
quantity. The ancients held the Maple in the great- 
est esteem ; and tables inlaid with curious portions 
of it, or formed entirely of its wood when finely 
variegated, fetched prices which, even to the manu- 
facturers of the buhl furniture of modern times, would 



THE MAPLE. 



125 



appear unconscionable and incredible. Virgil erects 
his throne for " the good Evander" of Maple, inlaid 
with ivory : and Pliny gives an elaborate account of 
its properties and value. The Maple rarely attains 
any considerable size: "We seldom see it em- 
ployed," says Gilpin, " in any nobler service than 
in filling up its part in a hedge in company with 
thorns, briars, and other ditch trumpery." In this 
situation its value seems to be judged by the com- 
pany it keeps, and to whose level it is generally 
reduced by the indiscriminating bill of the hedger. 
Nevertheless, when it is spared to attain its full size, 
it is beautiful in its character, if not dignified ; and 
is capable of being made highly ornamental. " It is 
the earliest sylvan beau that is weary of its summer 
suit, first shifting its dress to ochrey shades, then 
trying a deeper tint, and lastly assuming an orange 
vest. When first the Maple begins to autumnize 
the grove, the extremities of the boughs alone change 
their colour, but all the internal and more sheltered 
parts still retain their verdure, which gives to the 
tree the eifect of a great depth of shade, and displays 
advantageously the light lively colouring of the 
sprays." The constant excoriation of the bark also 
produces a variety of hues, which render the intro- 
duction of it very favourable to effect in landscape. 



126 



SYLVA BRITANNIC A. 



THE MAPLE IN BOLDRE CHURCH- 
YARD 

is ten feet in circumference at the ground, and at 
four feet, seven feet six inches ; at twelve feet, the 
trunk divides into branches ; and the entire height 
of the tree is about forty-five feet. This is considered 
the largest Maple in England, and is mentioned as 
such by Gilpin. 

It is not, however, solely from consideration of its 
size that it is introduced in these pages, but also from 
a desire on the part of the author to pay a tribute of 
well-deserved respect to the memory of so excellent 
and accomplished a man, as him by whom it has 
been chronicled ; the late Rev, Wi'lliam Gilpin ; 
who, after fulfilling his duties in the most exemplary 
manner for twenty years, as rector of the parish of 
Boldre, chose for his last resting-place this sweet 
sequestered spot, under the very tree he has given 
interest to by his record of it, and amidst the scenes 
he so much loved, and so well described : thus reali- 
zing the wish of Bloomfield, that favoured, though 
lowly votary of the rural Muse, 

" O Heaven permit that I may lie 

Where o'er my corse green branches wave ; 
And those who from life's tumults fly, 
With kindred feelings press my grave." 

Nor can a work professing to illustrate Forest See- 



THE MAPLE. " 127 

« 

nery, and to draw the attention of the reader to the 
pure and exalted pleasures which a love of nature 
inspires, conclude the portion of it which belongs 
to England better than with a tribute of respect to 
a name so connected with its object, and adorned 
with so many virtues as that of Gilpin. 



I 



TO 

JOHN MAXWELL, ESQ. 
OF POLLOC, 

MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT FOR THE COUNTY OF RENFREW, 
IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED, 
THE PORTION OF THIS WORK ENTITLED 

THE 

SYLYA SCOTICA; 

WITH THE HOPE THAT IT MAY AT ONCE PERPETUATE THE 
REMEMBRANCE OF SOME OF HIS 

FAVORITE TREES, 

AND THE ESTEEM IN WHICH HIS PATRIOTISM AND 
BENEVOLENCE ARE HELD BY 
HIS OBLIGED FRIEND AND SERVANT, 

THE AUTHOR. 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



Scotland is, in every respect, too interesting and 
too important a portion of Great Britain, to be passed 
over in any work illustrative of national topography ; 
and though it cannot in the present day be deemed, 
as it was in former ages, a thickly-wooded country, 
yet the specimens of Forest Scenery, which it af- 
fords in particular districts, are so grand and impres- 
sive, and many of the individual trees, of different 
species, so remarkable, and attended with so many 
" spirit-stirring " associations, that a much larger 
portion of this work might have been devoted to the 
illustration of them, had it not already nearly at- 
tained its destined limits ; even whilst the author 
still found subjects of beauty and interest, in every 
part of the kingdom, continually awakening his admi- 
ration ; and soliciting, nay, demanding his attention 
by attractions which he could not have resisted, had 
he not determined to carry his present undertaking 
no farther than the boundary he originally prescribed 



132 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



to it, when he first solicited that encouragement in 
its support, which he now has gratefully to acknow- 
ledge having been favoured with, beyond his most 
sanguine hopes. Under these circumstances, he 
trusts, that in devoting the concluding part of the 
Sylva Britannica to the trees of North Britain, 
he shall be considered as paying the tribute of his 
respect not only generally to 

" A country famed for industry and song," 

but also more particularly to those public-spirited 
noblemen and gentlemen, among the foremost of 
whom he would reckon him to whom his feelings of 
admiration and esteem have led him to dedicate this 
portion of his work, who are daily consulting the in- 
terests of posterity by clothing their native hills with 
rich plantations, and carrying into execution every 
benevolent and patriotic scheme that can increase 
the sum of human happiness, and raise man in the 
scale of intellectual being. 

Ancient Caledonia was, as the name implies, al- 
most one vast forest. Many of the bleak moors and 
mosses which now disfigure the face of the coun- 
try, and produce only barren heath, were formerly 
clothed with woods, that furnished useful timber 
and excellent pasturage. " During the twelfth and 
thirteenth centuries," says Chalmers, " not only the 
kings, but the bishops, barons, and abbots, had their 
forests in every district of North Britain, in which 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



133 



they reared infinite herds of cattle, horses, and 
swine. There are in the maps of Scotland, a thou- 
sand names of places which are derived from woods 
which no longer exist on the face of the country ; 
and there are in the Chartularies numerous notices 
of forests, where not a tree is now to be seen." 
It would be as easy to trace the causes of the 
decay of Scottish woods, as it is to prove that they 
formerly existed : devastating wars, and the im- 
provident and wasteful consumption of wood for 
fuel, as well for salt works as for domestic pur- 
poses, would sufficiently account for the thinning 
and final extinction of vast tracts of forest land, 
which when once denuded, the unsettled habits of 
the country in early times did not allow of restoring 
by planting. But the object of this work is to pre- 
serve individual remains, rather than go into general 
inquiries : it therefore only remains to remark, that 
under the spirited exertions of such planters as the 
Duke of Athol, the Duke of Montrose, Lord Moray, 
and many others, the hills of Scotland must in time 
be clad in all their ancient magnificence, with 

" trees of various shade. 

Scene behind scene with fair delusive pomp," 

and the country enriched by those generous bene- 
factors who seek no selfish gratification, beyond the 
conscious pleasure of having performed a disinter- 
ested duty. 



134 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE WALLACE OAK. 

There is perhaps no name in the annals of Scot- 
land more justly celebrated than that of Wallace ; 
one of the bravest of her heroes, and most disinte- 
rested of her patriots. Hence his steps are pointed 
out, wherever they can be traced, with almost re- 
ligious reverence : the mountain path which he may 
have tracked, the headlong torrent which he may 
have crossed, the rugged fastness in which he may 
have intrenched himself, still bear his name in many 
parts of the country, and still invite the wanderings 
and charm the imagination of those who are capable 
of feeling the force of the sublime sentiment — 

" Dulce et decorum est pro patria niori." 

Among the memorials to the fame of Wallace 
which the gratitude of posterity has delighted to 
point out, the trees under which he is known to 
have reposed or encamped, have been treated with 
a degree of attachment which, defeating its aim in 
its excess, has ultimately caused the destruction 
of the object it wished to commemorate. Hence the 
famous Oak in Torwood is no longer remaining. It 
stood in the middle of a swampy moss, having a 
causeway round it; but the last fragments of its 
ruins have been carried off by the pilgrims whom its 
fame attracted, and only the spot on which it stood 



THE OAK. 



135 



now remains for them to pay their devotions to. Of 
Earnside Wood, where Wallace defeated the Eng- 
lish, on the 12th June, 1298, and which formerly 
stretched four miles along the shores of the Frith, 
not a vestige is left ; and in the same manner, many 
other individual trees and woodland tracts, once 
rendered interesting by being associated with the 
valiant darings and hair-breadth scapes of Wallace, 
have bowed before the warring elements, or the un- 
pitying axe. One Oak which bears his name still 
however survives, and is perhaps more interesting 
than any of those we may otherwise lament, on ac- 
count of its standing immediately at the place of his 
birth, which was Ellerslie, or Elderslee, three miles 
to the south-west of Paisley, in Renfrewshire. It is 
mentioned by Semple, in his " Continuation of 
Crawfurd's History of Renfrewshire," as " the large 
Oak tree, which is still standing alone, in a little en- 
closure, a few yards south from the great road between 
Paisley and Kilbarchan ; being on the east side of 
Elderslee rivulet, where there is a stone bridge with 
one arch, the manor of Elderslee being a few yards 
distant from the rivulet on the west side. They say 
that Sir William Wallace and three hundred of his 
men hid themselves upon that tree, among the 
branches, (the tree being then in full blossom,) 
from the English. The tree is indeed very large, 
and well spread in the branches, being about twelve 
feet in circumference." p. 260. 4to. 1782. The pre- 



136 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



sent dimensions of the Wallace Oak, as communi- 
cated by Mr. Macquisten, an accurate land-sur- 
veyor, are twenty-one feet in circumference at the 
ground ; and at five feet from it, thirteen feet two 
inches. It is sixty-seven feet in height, and its 
branches extend on the east side to forty-five feet, 
on the west to thirty-six, on the south to thirty, and 
on the north to twenty-five, covering altogether an 
extent of nineteen English, or fifteen Scotch poles, 
land-measure. According to the testimony of aged 
residents in the neighbourhood, the branches of this 
tree, about thirty years ago, covered above a Scotch 
acre of ground ; and one old person pointed out a 
spot on the ancient turnpike road, forty yards north 
from the trunk of the tree, where he said that, when 
young, he used to strike the branches with his stilt. 
The Wallace Oak seems destined, in sharing the fame 
of others of its brethren, who have been honoured by 
sheltering the hero Wallace, to share their fate like- 
wise of despoliation : every year its branches pay 
tribute to its renown, and the western Highlanders, 
in particular, carry off relics from it in abundance, 
which threatens extinction, at no very distant period, 
to the parent stem, unless it be protected from fur- 
ther violence by its present owner, Archibald Spiers, 
Esq. of Elderslie, M.P. who may not be quite aware 
of the extent to which ravages are committed upon 
it through the good feeling, though mistaken judg- 
ment, of the majority of its visitants. 



THE SYCAMORE. 



137 



THE SYCAMORE 

is a species of the Maple : in favourable situations 
it. attains to a considerable stature, and will re- 
main a long time in a state of perfection. Evelyn 
accuses it of contaminating the walks, wherein it 
may be planted, with its leaves, which, like those 
of the Ash, fall early, and putrefy with the first 
moisture of the season. This great Oracle of the 
Forests therefore remarks, that with his consent it 
should be banished from all curious gardens and 
avenues, though he acknowledges that for more dis- 
tant plantations it is desirable ; particularly where 
better timber will not prosper so well, as in places 
near the sea ; it being no way injured by the spray, 
which is so prejudicial to most trees. The frequent 
allusions to the Sycamore in Holy Writ, show how 
much it was cultivated in divers parts of Asia. 
Zaccheus climbed up into a Sycamore-tree to see 
our Saviour ride in triumph to Jerusalem ; and we 
are told by St. Hierom, who lived in the fourth cen- 
tury after Christ, that he had himself seen this same 
tree ; a sufficient evidence of the length of time 
which it will stand without decay. It is said of 
Solomon, among his other meritorious deeds, that 
Cedars made he to be as the Sycamore trees that 
are in the vale, for abundance," 1 Kings x. 27. In 



138 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



his father David's time, an officer is mentioned as 
being appointed to superintend " the Olive trees, 
and the Sycamore trees that were in the low plains," 
1 Chron. xxvii. 28. And the royal Psalmist, in re- 
counting the marks of the Almighty's displeasure 
against the Israelites, includes his destroying " their 
Sycamore trees with frost." It is probably from 
associations of this kind that it has been planted 
more frequently near religious edifices than in other 
situations. 

THE SYCAMORE AT BISHOPTON, 

in Renfrewshire, is the property of Sir John Max- 
well, Bart. It is a stately spreading tree, twenty 
feet in circumference at the ground, about sixty feet 
in height, and contains seven hundred and twenty 
feet solid timber. It stands on the banks of the 
Clyde, on the opposite side of which the insulated 
rock of Dumbarton rises in solitary majesty, crowned 
with its strong fortress, of little use in " these weak 
piping times of peace," but once deemed the " Key 
of Scotland ; " and still exciting a melancholy inte- 
rest as the place where Wallace, that hero dear alike 
to the sober page of history, and the wilder graces 
of tradition, was delivered up to his enemies by the 
treachery of a pretended friend. 

The Sycamore was little known in this country, 
even so late as the 17th century, Chaucer speaks 




* 



THE SYCAMORE. 



139 



of it as a rare exotic in the 14th century : Gerard, 
who wrote in 1597, says, "The great Maple is a 
stranger in England, only it groweth in the walks 
and places of pleasure of noblemen, where it especi- 
ally is planted for the shad owe sake, and under the 
name of Sycomore tree." And Parkinson, speaking 
of the same, in 1640, says, " It is no where found 
wilde, or naturall in our land, that I can learn, but 
only planted in orchards or walkes, for the shadowe's 
sake." At present, however, it is to be found in all 
parts of the kingdom, especially in Scotland, where 
it grows to a great size, wearing an undaunted as- 
pect, and throwing out its bold arms, as if in defiance 
of the utmost inclemency of the skies. 

Perhaps the largest tree in North Britain is to be 
found at Kippenross, in Perthshire. Of its age the 
Earl of Marr communicated the following anecdote 
to Mr. Monteath, the intelligent author of " The 
Forester's Guide." " Mr. John Stirling, of Keir, 
who died in 1757, and made many inquiries of all 
the old people from eighty to ninety years of age, 
which takes us back to the reign of Charles II., 
near the Restoration : they uniformly declared, that 
they have heard their fathers say that they never 
remember any thing about it, but that it went by 
the name of the big tree of Kippenross." 



140 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE WYCH ELMS AT POLLOC. 

This graceful group of Wych Elms stands on the 
banks of the river Cart, at Polloc, in Renfrewshire, 
just beneath the site of the castle, occupied by the 
ancestors of Sir John Maxwell, Bart., the present 
proprietor, since the forfeiture of the Earl of Niths- 
dale, about the middle of the thirteenth century, 
chief of the family of Maxwell. 

The principal tree in this group is of extraordi- 
nary health and vigour, and does not exhibit the 
slightest appearance of decay ; it is completely 
covered with foliage, and its leaves, instead of being 
small, as is generally the case in old trees, are large 
and luxuriant ; it still sends forth its tribute of new 
shoots annually to the spring, and continues to in- 
crease both in height and girth. In 1812, it was 
ten feet ten inches in circumference at five feet 
from the ground ; in 1824, it measured eighteen feet 
one inch in circumference, at the surface of the 
ground, and eleven feet ten inches at five feet from 
the ground : its height is eighty-eight feet, and it 
contains six hundred and sixty-nine feet of solid 
timber. 



THE FIR. 



141 



THE FIR. 

Though the Fir will grow in all parts of the 
kingdom, and is as useful in clothing the barren 
wolds of Yorkshire as the rugged mountains of Scot- 
land, it perhaps no where attains such perfection as 
in the latter country ; particularly in those situations 
in the Highlands where it is most exposed to a 
northern aspect : for in proportion to the tardiness of 
its vegetation, in consequence of the little influence 
of the sun upon it for months together, it completes 
by slow and sure degrees the health and strength of 
its timber far beyond that which is nurtured to 
prematurity of stature in richer soils and warmer 
situations. 

This remark may be applied to all other timber 
trees as well as to the Fir. Pliny observes, that 
such as grow in moist and sheltered places are not 
so close, compact, and durable, as those which are 
more exposed. And Homer, who like Shakspeare 
had read the book of nature as well as that of hu- 
manity, judiciously assigns to Agamemnon a spear 
formed of a tree which had braved the fury of the 
tempest : he also puts into the mouth of Didymus 
the express reason for this choice ; because," says 
he, " it becomes harder and tougher in proportion as 
it is weather-beaten." 



142 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE FIR IN DUNMORE WOOD, 

Stirlingshire, the property of the Earl of Dunmore, 
perhaps the largest in the Lowlands of Scotland, is 
fully as remarkable for its beauty as for its magni- 
tude ; affording a very pleasing specimen of the cha- 
racteristic form of its species. It is sixty-seven feet 
in height ; eleven feet three inches in girth at the 
ground, and ten feet three inches at seventeen feet 
from it. The quantity of solid timber which it con- 
tains is two hundred and sixty-one feet, leaving out 
of the measurement all branches below six inches in 
diameter : its age is not known, though that of the 
Fir in general may be ascertained by the grain of the 
wood, which appears distinctly in circles, annually 
formed from the centre to the fork. " Upon cutting 
a tree close to the root," says Mr. Farquarson, of 
Marlee, in a letter to Dr. Hunter of York, " I can 
venture to point out the exact age, which in these 
old Firs comes to an amazing number of years. I 
lately pitched upon a tree of two feet and a half 
diameter, which is near the size of a planted Fir of 
fifty years of age ; and I counted exactly two hun- 
dred and fourteen circles or coats, which makes this 
natural Fir above four times the age of the planted 
one." 

Notwithstanding the remarks that have been made 



I 




THE FIR. 



143 



on timber in general being valuable in proportion to 
the length of time it has taken to acquire its perfec- 
tion, it must be acknowledged that the readiness 
with which the Fir may be forced to speedy growth 
is an advantage in many respects. Evelyn men- 
tions one which " did shoot no less than sixty feet 
in height, in little more than twenty years :" he, 
therefore, who may be waiting impatiently to see 
his newly-erected mansion enveloped in the graceful 
shade and salutary shelter which only stately trees 
can give, will do well to cultivate 

" Cedar, and Pine, and Fir, and branching Palm :" 

though even then he must not expect that his ave- 
nues will display the dignity of ages afforded by the 
Oak, — that truly patrician tree, emphatically termed 
by the Chinese " the tree of inheritance," which 
testifies so independently to the antiquity of the 
property which it may adorn. Nobility has been 
defined " ancient riches ;" and assuredly one of the 
most convincing outward signs of " ancient riches' 
is ancient timber ; as proud a badge of distinction to 
its proprietors as any that can be afforded by 
blazoned shields or storied urns, and a more de- 
sirable one, as allowing others to participate in the 
enjoyment of it, and inspiring only ideas of tran- 
quillity and usefulness. 



144 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE SILVER FIR AT ROSENEATH. 

The Silver Female Fir is the most beauteous and 
graceful of all its numerous tribe. It is common in 
the mountainous parts of Scotland, where, as Evelyn 
justly observes, " are trees of wonderful altitude, 
which grow upon places so inaccessible and far from 
the sea, that, as one says, they seem to be planted 
by God on purpose for nurseries of seed, and moni- 
tors to our industry; reserved, with other blessings, 
to be discovered in our days, amongst the new- 
invented improvements of husbandry, not known to 
our southern people of this nation. Did we consider 
the pains they take to bring them out of the Alps, 
we should less stick at the difficulty of transporting 
them from the utmost parts of Scotland." 

The Silver Fir represented in the plate, is the pro- 
perty of his Grace the Duke of Argyll. It is about 
ninety feet in height. In girth it is twenty-two feet 
four inches at one foot from the ground, and seven- 
teen feet five inches at five feet from the ground. 
Its solid contents are estimated at six hundred and 
nineteen cubic feet ten inches ; but this calculation 
is probably only an approximation to the truth. The 
age of the tree is unknown : the introduction of the 
Silver Fir into Scotland is however commonly un- 
derstood to have taken place two hundred and 



THE FIR. 



145 



twenty years since, which period corresponds very 
well with the size of this tree, when compared with 
others of the same species, the ages of which are 
known. Evelyn mentions two Silver Firs in Hare- 
field Park, Middlesex, " that being planted there 
anno 1603, at two years' growth from the seed, are 
now (1679) become goodly masts. The biggest of 
them from the ground to the upper bough is eighty- 
one feet, though forked on the top, which has not a 
little impeded its growth. The girth or circumfe- 
rence below is thirteen feet, and the length, so far as 
is timber, that is, to six inches square, seventy-three 
feet. In the middle seventeen inches square, amount- 
ing by calculation to one hundred and forty-six feet 
of good timber." — Sylva, p. 204. edit. 1776. 

This quickness of growth is only one of many re- 
commendations in this beautiful species of Fir : but 
it is one of great importance in regard to planting it 
in avenues, and near houses ; for which it is equally 
calculated by the graceful stateliness of its form, 
and the beauty of its foliage, presenting on one 
side the bright green of the emerald, and on the 
other a delicate relief of silvery stripes, which, when 
agitated by the wind, gives it an agreeable variety 
of appearance. 



K 



146 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE LARCHES AT DUNKELD. 

The Larch is a native of the Alps and Apennine 
mountains, and has not been introduced into this 
country more than a century. It is of quick growth, 
and flourishes best in poor soils and exposed situa- 
tions, which renders it valuable in those places, 
where land is of little other value than to afford foot- 
ing for such hardy mountaineers. 

The Larches represented in the accompanying 
plate, are the property of his Grace the Duke of 
Athol, and are supposed to be the largest in Scot- 
land : they were brought into the country about 
ninety years since, and w^ere at first placed in a 
green-house, under the idea that they were tender 
shrubs. The largest of them was measured in the 
month of March, 1796, and its dimensions were as 
follows. At three feet from the ground, ten feet and 
a half in circumference ; at twenty-four feet from 
the ground, seven feet seven inches ; its height 
eighty-five feet. In July 1825, it was measured 
again, and at the same distances from the ground ; it 
was found to be thirteen feet, and nine feet five 
inches in circumference, and had increased in height 
to ninety-seven feet and a half. These graceful 
trees are surrounded by objects of the most interest- 
ing nature, their branches almost touch the vene- 



THE LARCH. 



147 



rable remains of the Abbey of Dunkeld, whilst the 
bleak and barren hill which was once Birnham wood 
rises behind in the distance, and fills the imagination 
of the spectator with poetic feeling ; with thoughts 
of Macbeth, and Dunsinane, and of that master 
spirit who could thus give to airy nothings 

A local habitation and a name, 

that should make the lapse of centuries appear as 
moments only — so freshly does all he has ever 
described rush into the mind, whenever the scenes 
he has chosen for his actions present themselves to 
the eye. 

With the Thane of Cawdor, the writer of this 
article might say, whilst he was exploring the 
beauties of Dunkeld, " So foul and fair a day I have 
not seen," for it was one of incessant rain, which 
yet had no power to veil the enchantments of the 
scene, or to restrain his steps in quest of them ; 
never, indeed, did he find " the wildly devious 
walk" more delightful than that which he took alone, 
on the banks of the Tay, by one of the most silent, 
solemn, and sequestered paths that he had ever 
trodden. The freshness of the woods, the murmur- 
ing of the river, the noble aspect of the hills, pre- 
senting new features at every winding of the road, 
and arrayed in sober purple, or the deepest azure, 
tilled his mind with admiration and delight, undis- 
turbed by any trace of man, except what was here 



148 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



and there afforded by a solitary corn field, with its 
sheaves still standing, or a lonely cottage perched at 
some angle of a rock. As he retraced his steps, the 
grey tower of the ruined cathedral, bosomed in 
woods, and overhung by lofty hills purpled with 
heath, the few houses of the town clustering around 
it, and the broad river, winding along the valley, 
with his majestic, though modern bridge, formed a 
picture which nothing could have prevented him 
from sketching but the torrents of rain, that would 
have rendered the sketch illegible ; and which no- 
thing could have consoled him for leaving, without 
even an attempt to fix it, but the hope that he might 
at some future period revisit it, under circumstances 
more favorable to the lengthened contemplation of 
its beauties, which their variety and richness de- 
served. 



THE FORTINGAL YEW 



is one of the largest and oldest trees in Scotland : 
it stands in the Church-yard of Fortingal, or the 
Fort of the Strangers, so called from its being in 
the vicinity of a small Roman camp ; a wild ro- 
mantic district lying in the heart of the Grampian 
Mountains, comprehending Glenlyon and Rannoch, 
abounding in lakes, rivers, and woods, and formerly 
inhabited by that lawless tribe of freebooters, who. 



THE FIR. 



149 



setting the civil power at defiance in the intricacy of 
their fastnesses, laid all the surrounding country 
under that species of contribution so well known 
at the time it was exacted, by the name of Black- 
mail. 

This prodigious tree was measured by the Hon. 
Judge Barrington, before the year 1770, and is 
stated by him to have been at that time fifty-two 
feet in circumference ; but Pennant describes it as 
measuring fifty-six feet and a half. The same 
elegant tourist also speaks of it as having formerly 
been united to the height of three feet ; Captain 
Campbell, of Glenlyon, having assured him that 
when a boy, he had often climbed over the con- 
necting part. It is now however decayed to the 
ground, and completely divided into two distinct 
stems, between which the funeral processions were 
formerly accustomed to pass. It is impossible to 
ascertain its age ; but judging from its present state 
and appearance, it is not too much to suppose that 
its date is contemporary with that of Fingal himself, 
whose descendants the Highlanders in its vicinity 
are fond of styling themselves. 



150 



SYLVA SCOTICA. 



THE ASH AT CARNOCK. 

This beautifully luxuriant tree — 

" far spreading his umbrageous arm," 

almost embraces the venerable mansion near which 
it stands. It is the property of Sir Michael Shaw- 
Stewart, and is supposed to be the largest in Scot- 
land, even when measured at the smallest part 
of the trunk. Its dimensions in July 1825, at the 
time that the drawing of it was taken, were as 
follows: — ninety feet in height; thirty- one feet in 
circumference at the ground ; nineteen feet three 
inches, at five feet from the ground ; and twenty- 
one feet six inches, at four feet higher up. At ten 
feet from the ground it divides into three large 
branches, each of which is ten feet in circum- 
ference ; and their length is twenty-seven, twenty- 
eight, and thirty feet. The solid contents of the 
tree are six hundred and seventy-nine cubic feet. 
It was planted about the year 1596, by Sir 
Thomas Nicholson of Carnock, in Stirlingshire, 
Lord Advocate of Scotland in the reign of James 
VI. It is at the present period in full vigour 
and beauty, combining airy grace in the light- 
ness of its foliage and the playful ramifications 
of its smaller branches, with solidity and strength 



THE ASH. 



151 



in its silvery stem and principal arms. Delight- 
ful indeed is it to contemplate the variety and sur- 
passing beauty of many of these " houses not built 
with hands," proclaiming to the viewless winds, 
the eyes of heaven, and the heart of man, the wis- 
dom and the love of the Eternal Architect, whose 
fiat calls them into existence, and whose benevolence 
wills them to live for ages. Nor is it without regret 
that the Author sees himself arrived at the end of a 
task so congenial to his feelings, as that of comme- 
morating some of those silent but happy " inheritors 
of the earth," to which the shorter-lived habitants of 
it owe so much both of profit and enjoyment. Never- 
theless, he rejoices in the opportunity his work has 
afforded him, of consecrating to his native country a 
trophy illustrative of her woodland treasures, her 
pride, her ornament and defence ; a trophy which 
he would fain offer up to her as expressive of his 
ardent wishes for the continuance of her prosperity 
and happiness, and that they may endure and 
flourish for ages to come, in the full spirit of the 
Scriptural blessing, — • 

" As the days of a tree, are the days of my people." 



FINIS. 



PRINTED BY A. J. VALPY, 
RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON. 



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